Internet Learning Volume 1, Number 1, Fall 2012 | Page 33

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Internet Learning
3rd

I enjoyed having the recorded lectures available. They helped clarify questions
about the topics and added a “personal touch” to an otherwise impersonal online
format. I only watched one lecture, but that was due to time constraints on my
part…. Just be careful of camera position because sometimes you end up with a
glare.

3rd

I think the recorded lectures were very helpful when I could hear what you were
saying. The audio quality is very poor. I am currently trying to listen to the guest
lecturer and cannot hear a word.
I thought the recorded lectures were a helpful tool that I could use. I only used them
a couple of times when I was confused on the excel [financial] assignments, but they
gave me some clarification and gave me a better understanding of the material.
Apart from the flexibility that the Elluminate provides with accessing the lectures
(which are quite long, I should note), it also made me feel related to the learning
process as I realized that my questions on the material are shared with the other
students. The only two problems I faced using this experimental project are the
sound quality and logging in. There was a lot of background noise.
I found it difficult to hear the audio recordings at times, making the lecture hard to
follow. Otherwise I found the recordings to be a good way to reinforce lessons read
online.
My only complaint of the recorded lectures would be the sound quality. Sometimes
I couldn't hear what was being said, or questions that were asked by students. But I
do not know if this is the fault of the software or bad placement of the microphones.
I think the lectures are helpful and the software is interesting but not necessarily user
friendly. I would also have enjoyed the lectures more if I was looking at the front of
the class instead of your back. If the camera could be relocated so as to give the
viewer the experience of sitting at the back or middle of the class - facing front then I think I would have been able to retain information better.

3rd
4th

4th
4th
4th

Discussion
The rationale for undertaking this research was the feasibility of a technical solution that only
recently has become more affordable, and, thus, widely available. Any judgment about the
advisability of localized, non-institutional implementation of web-mediated broadcasts is beyond
the scope of this research. The preceding sections surfaced considerations bearing on the choice
by individual instructors to pioneer this type of solution. Until the widespread availability of
web-mediated distance education, both synchronous and asynchronous, is realized in the
foreseeable future, such a choice will confront many educators, as we struggle to take advantage
of technologies at hand to promote effective learning, while being less and less tied to a location.
The observed impact on at least one element of the CoI model, teaching presence, poses a
serious issue to be confronted. Further research is needed to establish the extent to which the
diminished presence noted here may generalize to other environments, particularly those where
production-quality hardware, software, and technical support offer greater stability, reliability,
and performance. Yet this research also revealed an apparent resilience in the learning process to
the observed shortcomings in teaching presence, making it possible to overcome technological,
pedagogical, or environmental deficiencies that appeared to prevent faithful re-creation of the