Guest Speakers from Around the World
and New Equipment for Interviews
Faculty and Staff Update: Spring 2009
As the new semester begins, we would like to tell you about some of the equipment we have purchased, and about how some of your colleagues are using technology to bring in guest speakers from around the world.
For Your Teaching
For Your Students
Miscellanous
Outside Speakers from the Mideast and Elsewhere via Skype.
Professor Sarah Swick who teaches People/Cultures of the Mid-East in the Anthropology Department brings in an outside speaker to each class, often from Saudi Arabia. Not only can the students ask questions of this speaker but they can see the speaker on the screen at the front of the room. And all of this is free and does not require making a reservation for the video-conferencing equipment in the Model Classroom.
Swick uses Skype to call the speaker in Saudi Arabia and a projector attached to a laptop borrowed from the Faculty Corner to display the video image of the speaker. With the laptop connected to a projector, the image students see is life-size. The only problem in class, Swick says, is that students have to move to the laptop to ask the speaker questions. CTE will purchase omnidirectional mics such as the Radio Shack Boundary Microphone, Model #33-3022, so that faculty can pick up students' questions in class without students having to move to the laptop.
The guest speaker overseas or in another location in the United States will need a webcam to capture his or her image and a Skype account or a phone.
If your speaker does not have a Skype account, you will need to purchase minutes from Skype to call an international phone number. The cost is $.021 per minute, in other words, two cents a minute for international calls.
As you may know, the Skype software is a free download from Skype.com. Calls on Skype are free or to close to free since it uses the Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) to route your calls through the Internet. Staff in the Faculty Corner at ext. 2734 will help you get started with Skype if Skype's online documentation at http://www.skype.com/allfeatures/videocall/ is not clear, or if you just want hands-on practice making Skype video calls before you call invite an outside speaker to your class.
To share your image with the overseas speaker, you will need a webcam attached to your laptop. Please reserve a webcam from the Faculty Corner (ext. 2734). If you prefer to use your own laptop, please test your webcam or a webcam you have borrowed from the Faculty Corner well before your event.
Using Personal Response Pads to Engage Large Classes
If you are teaching a introductory class with a large number of students in the fall, consider using personal response pads in your class to increase the engagement of your students. No longer will your questions have to be rhetorical. Now each student can answer on his or her own. You can find out what they know about a topic before you begin your explanation of a new topic. You can posit hypotheses before experiments or surveys and ask them to choose between competing hypotheses. In other words, you can encourage thinking rather than day-dreaming in that 9 AM Physics or Psychology class.
Professor Nathan Harshman invites interested faculty to see his use of personal response pads in Physics classes in McKinley 108 on Tuesdays and Fridays from 9:55 - 11:10 and also on TF 11:20-12:35. Professor Harshman says an advance notice of your visit is not necessary. He will be using response pads until the last class of the spring semester.
You will need to order the response pads through the bookstore well before the fall semester, and also practice with the software before the fall. Please call Joe Grimme at ext. 3904 for details. Students can buy response pads for $22 each with a $15 per semester registration fee. The bookstore will buy back used response pads for $11.
Your students will be able to find assistance with personal response pads here. To see how faculty use personal response pads on other campuses, and students' attittudes about the use of personal response pads, click here.
Save Information for References for Students
Professor Naomi Baron of CAS reminded us that the current strategy of keeping only two years of classes on Blackboard may inconvenience faculty as they write references for their students who have graduated some years ago. Professor Baron recommends that faculty download their Gradebooks from Blackboard each semester and store these records appropriately. Here are the steps:
Open your Blackboard course and click Control Panel.
- Click Gradebook.
- Click Download Grades.
- Select Comma (Windows) or Tab (Mac) and click Submit.
- Using Firefox as your browser, right click on Download, and then use the “Save Link As” option to save the Gradebook to your computer. With Internet Explorer as your browser, click on Download and then “Save.”
- Open Excel.
- Open the downloaded Gradebook file from within Excel.
Borrow a New Class-Set of 50 Digital Recorders for Students' Fieldwork
In response to requests from faculty for more digital recorders so that an entire class of students can record interviews in the field, CTE has purchased 50 Olympus recorders. These recorders are very easy to use and plug into USB ports in computers for the download of interviews. After download, the interviews in .mp3 format can be edited in Audacity, a free audio-editing program, if necessary.
Please call the Faculty Corner at ext. 2734 to arrange a loan of the recorders. Please call the New Media Center at ext. 2560 for help with Audacity.
Students Can Record Phone Interviews
Faculty have had success this spring recording interviews on their desktop computers using Skype ( a free download from Skype.com) and PrettyMay (a Skype recording plug-in available for $24.95). As you may know, Beth Scudder of CTE at ext. 2305 will reimburse faculty for teaching related purchases up to $100 per semester. The sound quality on Skype depends on the connections in use, of course, but it is often better than normal telephone quality.
Gizmo5's sound quality is acceptable but was not as good as Skype in our test calls. The free built-in recording does, however, make Gizmo5 attractive.
Free Conference Calls for Students Working in Groups.
Both Skype and Gizmo5 offer free conferences calls for users with free Skype or Gizmo5 accounts. Students can often accomplish more in group activities in these conference calls rather than through instant messaging or email. CTE recommends that all instructors in distance education classes require Skype or Gizmo5 accounts of their students this summer, and that faculty in face to face courses encourage the use of these applications for conference calls. To learn more about free conference calls for up to ten people through Skype Click Here.
See Your Bookmarks at Home and Office
Finally, if you would like quick access to your favorite web sites on both home and office computers, CTE suggests that you try del.icio.us, a bookmarks manager. With del.icio.us on the toolbar of your browser, your collection of bookmarks will be available on both home and office computers.
Questions, please contact:
The Blackboard Support Team at 202-885-3904
Jim McCabe, Web Courseware Manager at 202-885-2553
Dr. Kelly Nolin, CTE Training Manager at 202-885-6077
The Faculty Corner at 202-885-2734
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