Introductory videos about Panopto

February 17, 2011 at 5:18 pm | Posted in lecture recording | Leave a comment
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I’ve just completed two complementary videos about Panopto; one aimed at staff and the other at students. Each is about 8 minutes long. Naturally they were entirely produced using Panopto, so you’ll be able to see how the viewer interface works.

You may need to install Microsoft Silverlight on your PC if you are using Windows XP or MacOS.

If you’re using Linux or an iPhone, iPad or Android device (or are just curious) then here are the MP4 podcast versions for staff and students. Coming soon – another video showing you how to find and use podcast URLs in Panopto.

The Perils of PDF

June 25, 2010 at 2:10 pm | Posted in hands-on | Leave a comment
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Normally I think of PDF files as a simple solution to cross-platform access, but I’ve had some problems with it this week. The first of these was to do with the narrated slide shows created using Adobe Presenter. As I’ve mentioned before, this is an add-on to PowerPoint that makes it simple to record narrations for each slide and then output it in a compact size with great navigation – it also enables some extras such as file attachments and embedded test questions with audio feedback. There are two output options 1) a ZIP file containing all the SWF graphics, MP3 audio, HTML web page and the bits and bobs that make up the interface or 2) a PDF file containing the same. I thought that the PDF option was easier to use, as it is a single file that is simple to add to Blackboard or EdShare – so just click the link to view. The ZIP file is a little more complex to add in both cases – its not difficult, but it isn’t as easy as adding a PDF.

However, this week I found that older versions of the free Adobe Reader don’t play nicely with this type of PDF – and we can’t expect all our users to have the latest. More seriously, it doesn’t work for Apple Mac users who typically use the built-in Preview application to view PDFs and have never gotten round to installing Adobe Reader. As a result, I ‘ve pulled all the PDF presentations from EdShare and replaced them with the ZIP version.

The other fly in the PDF ointment is its inability to convert URLs that are split over two lines in a document – it just uses whatever is on the first line. I tried cheating it in Word by splitting the URL into two text segments and then linking each of them to the whole URL, but Acrobat’s automated conversion ignored this ruse. Eventually, I created TinyURLs for the dysfunctional links so they did just fit on one line.

Audio Feedback on Assignments

June 8, 2010 at 3:20 pm | Posted in communication | Leave a comment
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The idea that students might prefer spoken rather than written feedback is not a new one; indeed the ideal would be a leisurely one-to-one chat about your essay with your tutor. Harsh economic realities have made this a distant dream, except perhaps in the more rarified cloisters of Oxbridge. A modern twist is that tutors can record their comments and email them to students – and the ExAEF project at Liverpool John Moores University is ‘exploring the efficacy of audio email feedback’. They are using the Wimba add-on for Blackboard to simplify the technical procedure and have gained some feedback from the students which is summarised in this presentation.

For tutors, a key message might be that the average time spent creating feedback comments per student was around half that for written feedback – 4:30 as opposed to 8:50 – for a cohort of 24 students. That’s over 100 minutes saved!

For students, the audio feedback was clear and understandable, perceived as more detailed and felt more personal and informal. They found the voice intonation motivating and thought it inspired interest in their topic of study. It seems that students made better use of the audio feedback and had better retention of salient points for future learning.

Now we don’t use Wimba at Southampton (unfortunately they gave a disastrous demo here a couple of years back) but I can offer advice and support to any tutors here who would be interested in trying out audio feedback.

This topic was the subject of  a one-day conference I attended last year ‘A Word in Your Ear: Audio Feedback‘ and I particularly remember one of the pitfalls mentioned – the impact of ‘tone of voice’ and the negative effect that marking late into the night can have on this!

Adobe Connect video – how to re-use a meeting

October 6, 2009 at 4:20 pm | Posted in systems | Leave a comment
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I’ve just uploaded a new video to EdShare that shows how you can quickly edit an existing meeting room in Adobe Connect so you can send email invites about the new date and time to the participants. This is useful as the invites include iCal info that enables you to add the meeting to your Outlook diary with the click of a button.

Changing text and background colours in Adobe Acrobat Reader

October 2, 2009 at 3:29 pm | Posted in useful links | Leave a comment
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Another day, another video – the more I make the quicker it gets. This one is a 4-minute guide for students who suffer from dyslexia or visual stress, and shows how to change the background and text colours to meet their specific needs. Of course it also makes good sense to provide this info visually, rather than on paper.

Four short lessons on podcasting

August 10, 2009 at 10:53 am | Posted in lecture recording | Leave a comment
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Four really useful blog posts from Michael Hanley, covering the importance of pace, pitch, projection and pauses in creating effective educational podcasts. Audio examples allow you to hear what he is talking about.

Of course, good lecturers already make use of these techniques in their teaching, but podcasts rely on them because they are are audio-only.

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