Using Screencasting (e.g. Skype) to engage and build community with online learners
Idea
Skype is still a very easy, reliable and free way to screencast (share screens and videoconference). Have an expert, or student traveling in a foreign land, projected on screen and interact with them via voice (students come up to the microphone), video (if you have a video camera attached to your computer) or text (make the keyboard available for "instant message" postings during the screencast.
Other ideas from this article by Dr. Jacqueline Mangieri from Online Education:
- Provide course orientations: A faculty member might create a brief screencast to provide a welcome and visual orientation to a class. This can be especially helpful for new online learners. The instructor might log into the online classroom as a student and record a “tour” of the class, including how to submit assignments, where to check grades, and other important student tasks.
- Deliver instructional lectures: Screencasting also allows the professor the opportunity to provide some direct instruction in the online classroom. Imagine a math teacher’s screencast that demonstrates her working a problem while narrating an explanation of the steps. Or perhaps a computer teacher can explain a complicated process while visually showing in the screencast what is occurring.
- Provide student feedback: Screencasting can be a highly effective tool for giving feedback. It’s a great way to have an asynchronous “conference” with students about their work. The ability for the instructor to provide narrative comments while showing corrections on the computer screen appeals to a wide variety of learning styles and preferences.
- Encourage student sharing: An important online learning opportunity in many classes occurs when students are encouraged to share their work, and screencasting can take this sharing to a powerful level. In a screencast, students can articulate what they have learned and can explain their work process. Furthermore, the students who view these screencasts can learn even more from the explanations of their peers, and the instructor can gain valuable formative assessment information from these screencasts as well.
