Last week, our group met to discuss our stand alone professional development tutorial. We met Tuesday, February 7 at 8:00pm. Prior to this meeting, we had talked a little on the discussion board for class, and then moved onto a google doc for all of us to contribute in more of a continuous discussion than Angel discussion allows.
For this web conference, we decided to use Adobe Connect. Chuck had mentioned that this would be an option in our live session for class, and we decided this was the best option. This program worked really well. Initially, we had a little trouble with echoing microphones, but quickly got it fixed. I was also kicked out at one point, but got right back in. One major advantage was the ability for all of us to easily communicate verbally and possibly share documents via the screen share option. This does not have a time limit, and we were able to talk a little before recording the meeting as we were all getting set up. As mentioned, we only had a couple of problems, but that may have occurred with any web conferencing. One challenge, was having all of us speaking, it was a little difficult to know when someone else would speak or when longer silences would occur. It did not necessarily flow, like I would anticipate a face to face meeting would have. That is a disadvantage of technology, that body language and visual cues were not present. The only disadvantage to Adobe Connect, was not having unlimited access to the resource. It was great to use, but had to be set up prior to starting the conference. That would not be a disadvantage if one of us had this on our computers already.
There is a free trial for 30 days, but then we would need to pay for the access. I do not think that this is a resource I would use on a regular basis to justify purchasing it. We may have had more challenges with the program had it not been set up prior to our conference by our professor. Although Jing has a time limit, that would serve my purpose the majority of the time, but in this situation, Jing would have been frustrating having the time limit and potential sound problems.
Overall, it went very well, and was an excellent resource for our purpose. I am excited for our project! You can view our brainstorm discussion by following this link.
From the sounds of it, your web conference went well, but it could have gone smoother. Did you ever figure out why you got kicked off? Technology always presents interesting scenarios. :)
ReplyDeleteIn regards to your sound issues, did everyone have a head set? The reason for the echo is because people's speakers are being picked up by their mics. So, an easy way to avoid this is by using a headset.
Also, if you are having issues with delay (and, consequently, cutting each other off), I would suggest using the "raising your hand" icon in Adobe, which will signify that you (or whoever needs to talk). Just an idea. :)
You need to add a link to your recorded session. I have watched it already (because your group members added the link), but it needs to be on your blog post...
I'm excited to see the final project...Prezi is such a wonderful tool.
Thanks for the great suggestions! I'm sure that through playing with it, we could have run our discussion much more smoothly. It was nice to finally be able to "talk" to my group!
ReplyDeleteThanks for setting it up!