EdTech 521: Final Synchronous Lesson

The end has arrived, and with it comes the fireworks! Here is a link to the recording of my online lesson (on building a Book Study Website) using Adobe Connect: Fuhry - Final Synchronous Lesson

I feel pretty good about the result!  I was a little nervous, but I am glad I a) pressed the record button and b) didn't turn it into a fumbling train wreck!  I thought my lesson did a good job of highlighting various features of this synchronous teaching technology while allowing me to teach and interact in a natural way.

I believe this lesson was appropriate for a real-time environment because it included two new skills that may be unfamiliar to a student.  The first skill is thinking about a book "report" in a new way -- as a highly creative multimedia process steeped in personal connection and exploration.  Students may be confused or overwhelmed by this request because it might be out of their comfort zone.  By being (virtually) present for the presentation and explanation of this summative performance task, I could engage in discussion with my students and be present for any questions they might have.  The second skill that may also be unfamiliar to my students is basic website design. I feel that the real-time environment allowed for a back-and-forth of showing and telling on both the teacher and student's part. This exchange of screen sharing and trial-and-error discovery hopefully removed some of the intimidation a student might otherwise feel if they were asynchronously assigned to build a website, were given a load of documents, and were told "let me know how it goes".  Having a teacher initially there for comfort, reference, and motivation should help a student kick start this project.  First and foremost, however, I feel the real-time aspect of this lesson is critical because of the real-time discussion and demonstration of skills.

The lesson could be improved in the future by perhaps dividing the lesson into two or three sessions: 1) Introduction to the Assignment 2) Introduction to Wix 3) Reciprocal Teaching and Troubleshooting (formative assessment).  I believe this lesson was a little long, although it wasn't as long as a traditional brick-and-mortar class meeting.  Ideally, however, the student would have more exploration time.  I felt that this lesson became a bit too lecture-based because it involved the presentation of a lot of new, specific information.  I would have hoped to use the collaboration whiteboard board more to flesh out some preliminary ideas together with my student. Asking more critical thinking questions of my students might have also helped them stay engaged (vs. passive) in the first part of the lesson. I should also have planned set tasks that my student worked through when he took over control of my screen.  There are probably very important skills and elements I overlooked because I kept that part of lesson a bit organic and experimental.  (I also completely forgot to mention how to publish the website, which is a crucial piece!)  In general, it was a difficult balance knowing what extent of a Wix tutorial I should provide my student.  I didn't want to steal away too many "aha" moments of their own discovery of Wix tools and features. That being said, I hope I didn't share too much and confuse the student!

If the lesson were split up into smaller meetings, then there would be time between sessions for the students to come back with specific questions that pertain to their unique website creation. It was probably difficult for my student to come up with questions during this particular lesson because it was still new, undigested information.  By dividing up this lesson, there would also be more time to talk about potential multimedia creations for each subpage in greater detail. If this were a bigger class, perhaps each student could highlight one of their multimedia creations each week as a peer-teaching opportunity. Going forward, I would also provide a completed website as an exemplar to share with the students so that there was some kind of visual aid for the endpoint.

All in all, however, the lesson was a success. My student exclaimed that he learned a lot (but was glad he didn't REALLY have to do the assignment as it looked pretty challenging!)

EdTech 521: Working with Synchronous Lessons

Last week my partner and I took the opportunity to practice synchronous lesson delivery through Adobe Connect, which I found to be a promising and versatile digital lesson delivery medium.  Please view our "testing" session here: http://edtech.adobeconnect.com/p2ogviatb48.  Dana and I struggled with a few of the tools because my Safari web browser was not working well with the Adobe permissions requirements.  Overall, however, we found it intuitive to utilize and navigate.

We enjoyed exploring various features of the software including screen sharing, the collaborative whiteboard, different "controls" of a host vs. participant, and screen arrangement/display.  I can see how with this format there is an increased dynamic nature of a lesson, which allows students to maintain engagement instead of passively listening to a lecture, taking notes, and answering questions or working out problems independently.  Teacher presence is strong (with voice, video, presentation, and notetaking), and a sense of community with other participants (classmates) is consistent throughout the meeting. As Yun Park and Curtis Bonk advised in their article Synchronous Learning Experiences:
Distance and Residential Learners’ Perspectives in a Blended Graduate Course, interaction and collaboration skills which are "critical elements influencing typical learning experiences within online courses" (p. 245) are present in a synchronous meeting using this platform. 

I have never taken part in a lesson of this nature, but can see how it would be an interesting and appealing experience.  In fact, I believe a student would be much less passive participating in this kind of learning than might otherwise be the case in a traditional classroom.  At this point, I'm not quite sure how an Adobe Connect lesson for students below the middle school years would look, as there is definitely a fair degree of navigation and technical skill required by the participant.  Nevertheless, the various modes of communicating and sharing images, files, etc. accommodates adolescent and adult learners with a multitude of learning styles.  I look forward to exploring all of the options further as I make my more "official" asynchronous lesson.