Splash!

Welcome to my blog

This blog is used as a reflective diary for various course I am doing/have done. I’ve tagged each post accordingly PTLLS, PGCAP, Learn2.0 etc…

PTTLS: Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector

PGCAP: Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice

Learn2.0: Posts from a course I wrote and then participated in: Learning 2.0 @ Salford.

Anything else is a bonus, honest!

Changes made to video due to feedback

I completed my final report early this week and in it my action point for the future was to cut out any spurious bits in the video and re-upload it.

I’ve done that now and uploaded it to YouTube. Our webmaster will be changing the embedded one on our ICT Training homepage and I’ve also uploaded it to my YouTube site here.

When it got down to it – there wasn’t as much as I had hoped that was removable… it was all relevant apart from maybe a minutes worth of video. But I did what I could and am now putting it to bed, so to speak.

Right… so what’s the next project…

I’m live…

Yay! It’s live! It has been for a week now and I’ve been gathering feedback where I can.  I am quite pleased with it but there is also much I could still do with it.

Here are the links (stats measured today 15/12/11):

• videoette: http://bit.ly/videoette (43 views on YouTube – 1 like)
• diagnostic: http://bit.ly/videoette_DiagnosticTest (no use of this tool or click-throughs from bit.ly)
• feedback: http://bit.ly/videoette_feedback (2 responses)
• USIR (for download’s and materials): http://bit.ly/USIR_learn (4 downloads)
• (embedded high res version on our training website: http://www.salford.ac.uk/library/help/training) (26 views)

I have received feedback in various forms, only a couple from the feedback form unfortunately, but others from comments on facebook and directly from staff and students. I will correlate all and put it into my final report but the main push for me from here is to shorten it or make it more accessible to navigate through.

A lot of the feedback said that people got bored in the first few minutes, on reflection most videos on YouTube are ~5mins long and when I question myself I do turn off if something has not grabbed my attention by then. I drew recommendations for length from analysis of papers of other recorded lectures, but I feel that what I have now learned is more pedagogically sound for this context. The nature of the lecture is ‘leading the students in’ to the content and the more difficult concepts, but maybe that can be removed for a videoette of this type. I’m going to try it in the new year and see if that is a more successful approach.

It is important to me and the team that this is able to be a successful venture and that the students are able to learn from it. I did get great feedback that those that maintained interest did learn from it, so to enable this and the ‘shorter’ option I could possibly include bookmarks so that students can skip to the bits that are relevant to them rather than having to skip through using the video slide bar- I myself found it very hard to use the video slide to get to a specific section – and I know the content really well by now.

This type of learning only works well if you are able to absorb the information in this way, i.e. a audial or visual learner (kinaesthetic learners would need to download the materials in advance of watching the videoette). With 69 views on YouTube but only 4 downloads from USIR it could be inferred that students are able to do this, but this could also lead to inference that only 4 maintained interest enough to download materials! Feedback of this kind (quantitative ‘hits’) is hard to draw conclusions from for application to pedagogical learning and as such I will be paying more attention to the qualitative feedback I received.

To draw more conclusions the video will need to be up longer and more feedback would need to be acquired, preferably using the feedback form. When I re-edit the videoette I will try and make the feedback form more prevalent to allow for reflection in depth.

If you follow this then please leave feedback for me – good or bad I can then use this to improve and move forward with my practice. Thanks

Rendering the final product

The final stages are here!

I rendered the videoette last week and sent it to a few colleagues for comments. I’ve then, from feedback received, enhanced the audio a little and today and tomorrow I’m re-rendering and uploading. Yay!

I’ve also been in consultation with our metadata officers; this videoette will now be a pilot for the Universities repository for learning objects – which is quite exciting. I’ve updated the videoette opening title page to reflect this, including a link to the repository. This has actually helped me too as its provided an easy way to link through to the stored learning materials mentioned in the videoette.

The whole process has taken longer than I anticipated, particularly with the extra tweaks & repository work. There is still much to do regarding feedback and analysis and I fear this may be more limited than I originally hoped with the time in hand left. Hopefully I can provide enough to fulfill the requirements for the module.

I’ll post a link as soon as it’s live

Presentations last week and progress this week

Presentations

So last week was presentation of our progress time… You know, it’s funny, no matter how many times I teach and in what different contexts, giving a presentation always makes me a little nervous. Teaching seems to be different as the content is on show rather than you. I know this is a very minor point and whenever I work I am on show to a certain extent, but it still feels different. I think the ‘assessment’ part is a contributing factor too but it does make food for thought.

My presentation seemed to go well though, it was a bit rushed as time was drawing thin by the time it got round to me and most of the attendees had left, but I was able to present to the 3 of us left and the staff/teaching team were there. I got really good feedback on ideas, the main ones being to try Jing as an open source solution and to mix up my video with the camtasia rather than running separately. My presentation is here if you want to see it – although I’m not sure the video’s will work in slideshare!?! {just checked and no they don’t – let me know if you want a copy although the finished product should be up soon, hopefully… *currently have a few glitches to overcome!}

Of the feedback given the former was unfortunately a misnoma as Jing only seemed to do static screen capture – but it is a useful tool provided by the same team as camtasia so worth knowing about. The second point by Jonathan was very valid and I’ve been chopping up my video to accommodate it. It’s taking more time but I think it will be worth it.

I also gained a lot by listening and watching the other presentations, particularly learning about other packages of use for future projects such as DropBox, Adobe Acrobat full edition and Guide, I also may have to try using iPadio to blog here – but that’s for when I have more time to play I think!

Current Progress

This week has been a nightmare if I’m honest. I got a copy of a camtasia licence through work and so haven’t had to keep using the trial. Unfortunately the video would just not upload into camtasia. The tech who kindly converted it from the camera for me did a fresh convert into .wmv instead of the original .mp4 but still camtasia wasn’t happy. It was very odd as it worked fine if playing in vlc player and in windows movie maker (the software I used to make the edit for the presentation).

As a result I worked with windows movie maker instead, spending a good few hours chopping up the clips and stitching together to create the videoette. Once I had it perfect I went to save the project file as a movie file – and then the real problems began Movie maker would simply just not save it for me, no matter how low I set the bit rate or how many times I checked the source files, save location etc… changing from shared drives to local drives etc etc…

After much stress and pulling of hair I got back in touch with the teccie who made the original converts from the camera for me. He very kindly re-converted them as .avi files for me (I’m so glad he still had them!). He saved in low res version first to test and see if that worked – which is has thankfully and now opens in camtasia – so now I’m just waiting for the downloads of the high res versions he’s done for me (I think I owe the guy a couple of pints!).

This has put me back by a week and meant I’ve lost a lot of work and effort Hopefully now though I will be able to move forward and have the files published in the next week instead… Time-scales are So So tight on this project that it’s proving very hard to keep up, fingers crossed there are no more glitches like this one!

All going to plan I should be able to re-mash-up the content  - watch this space…

Preparation for ‘action’!

Tomorrow is the big day… the recording is happening in the morning session. To be honest I’m a bit nervous, especially as I’ve been ill this week and I’m not feeling a million dollars, but hopefully I can still pull it out of the bag. Everything is booked and ready to go – and I’ve changed the room to Allerton so that there is a smart board – hopefully better than the sympodium I use in the Clifford training room as it’s easier to see, for both the students and the video.

Next week we have to present on our progress which, as I’ve not made much, (or at least it feels that way – so little time, so much to do!), I’m also pondering hard about. As a result I’ve elected this week to download a Camtasia Trial and try out the software for use in the videoettes (to enhance them). I’m not sure I’ll have the time to use it extensively, but as it’s for work too I’m hoping I can blend the two a little and make the best of this project.

I am loving getting my teeth into something new again – it seems so long ago that I was playing with PRS (personal response systems) in my lectures for the core module, {which incedentially I must upload here when I remember!}.

So the order of the day has been playing with new software (Although whyyy do these things take so long to download and install…) and tutorials – perfect! If only every day was a PGCAP day

 

Just a short note on last weeks activities too – as I didn’t get time to post in the end as work seemed to fly away with me (and a weekend of visiting friends!

Last week I spent a fair bit of time planning things out and thinking of feedback options, here is a run down of what I concluded:

Things Outstanding:

• Record lecture
• Learn Camtasia
• Incorporate camtasia, video splice, (& PPT/SmartBoard screen shots – camtasia may do this?!)
• Convert above into varying formats to allow download and streaming
• Create/Incorporate exercises to match videoettes & link to online training and manuals
• Create survey and diagnostic for feedback
• Upload video and content
• Marketing!

Feedback:

• PROfiler Survey/Bristol Survey (cf Survey Monkey)
• PROfiler diagnostic
• Focus group

Online elluminate session

Just a quick update today:

I really enjoyed the online session yesterday, much more than I was expecting to. I got a lot out if hearing what the other participants were doing and I very much felt the solidarity of all ‘being in the same boat’.

I’m quite excited and fired up about my project, the papers I’ve read so far have given insight into lots of different aspects,some of which I’d not considered in so much depth. 

I’m looking forward to getting my teeth into the meat of the work

Web Posters Bespoke Lecture for Civil Engineers

I’ve been doing some bespoke work for the Civil Engineering cohort; namely teaching them how to create web posters. I worked on a demo site and edited their handbook this summer but now the lectures are in full swing I thought I’d post about it!

Having only 2 hours of lecture time and 1 hour tutorial (which has recently change to 2 as more time was needed) I decided to use Google Sites rather than teaching the students web design from scratch.

On the whole the lectures have gone well, its a very mixed cohort of approximately 100 students in all. Although I offered the opportunity to learn web design from scratch, all have decided to use google sites (some opting to use another web creation service).

The students seem to be relishing work that can be taken forward into their careers rather than just left in the VLE and I’m pleased that they are getting something so useful from it. Google sites seems to be a bit glitchy in places (mainly the nightmare of templates – I’m hoping they fix that soon!!), but on the whole its an easy ‘plug and play’ solution.

I’m in continual flux with the demo site I set up for them: https://sites.google.com/site/uosdigitalskills/ and I’m hoping to be able to post links to some of the students work at the end of the project.

Literature review

Last Thus I started my lit review. I was pleasantly surprised at the quantity and quality of available papers.

I’ve just finished my first: Lecture capture: making the most of face to face learning (Davis 2009).

It has made me think about my initial concept of videoettes. I may be better putting a whole lecture out there with table of contents.

Having said that, the captures in the paper were for supplementary revision rather than initial learning, and it broadens my mind to the possible inability of these videoettes to provide learning in its own right. Something I will definitely need to explore with the feedback and focus groups and consider when preparing my material.

My thoughts at the moment are on the option of providing both full lecture and videoette and analysing stats and feedback to see which is most popular and, hopefully, effective. Time will of course be a factor to consider.

ADU session on e-submission

My first ADU session on e-submission is about to commence. I’m hoping to learn enough to impart knowledge to the students subsequently… fingers crossed

Ok, feedback: session went well and I learnt a fair bit. There were a few glitches but at the moment that seems to be the norm…

Nice to see it from a student perspective and to go through the originality report for the first time. It seems on balance to be a useful tool and I’m now much happier supporting students if they need it.

The only other aspect of the training is that I thought the trainers dealt with difficult questions very well; change is always a sensitive point and can be hard to manage.

All in all a good afternoon.

AV booked :)

I’ve booked my AV support for my lecture on the 4th Nov. Fingers crossed it all goes to plan. A bit of prep to do recording screen shots and doing voice over but its all coming together.

Lit review tomorrow…