Video Conferencing Part 2

As promised following up my previous post on video conferencing, in this post is links that may get your ideas buzzing on how you can use it but also to give you an Overview of the different things that are possible and where to find out other information.

As ever BECTA has a great resource giving you a full heads up about Video conferencing how to use it; when to use it; how to develop links with organisations and it even supplies you with a list of which organisations and businesses offers video conferencing and activities (this includes NASA, Science Museum in London, the National Coal Mine Museum and many more). There are also more case studies than you can shake a stick at which may give you a further insight!

Global Leap are set up to promote the use of Video conferencing in the classroom and are a not for profit organisation. They arrange many events that you can participate in which can take some of the headache out of using this technology with a regular newsletter that details upcoming events. Although there is a £250 a year subscription this is well worth it as it also gives you a point of contact and advice....also if you are not very technical they will talk to the IT technicians to make sure all is well from the computer point of view. Further Information about Global Leap

Video Conferencing - Part One

Video-conferencing offers more opportunities than you may think. Many Museums and Businesses offer specially tailored Video-conferencing events ranging from an actor being a World War I actor talking about his experiences and taking questions from the class to ongoing mentoring from a business while a class completes a project!

Video-conferencing might seem like an intimidating technology, requiring expensive equipment and special technical expertise from teachers. In fact, a wide range of video-conferencing products is now available, ranging from low-cost webcams for personal use to sophisticated professional video-conferencing suites costing several thousand pounds.

At the most basic level, you can set up a simple two-way video-conferencing system using just two PCs equipped with webcams. A webcam – web camera – is a small video camera that can be connected to any computer equipped with a USB connection. In fact, some computers, such as Apple’s iMacs and MacBooks, have built-in webcams.

Video-conferencing software
Most webcams include basic video-conferencing software that will allow you to create a simple two-way conference session. There are also several free programs, such as the popular MSN Messenger, that can be used for video-conferencing. Many pupils will already be familiar with this software, so very little training or technical knowledge is required.

This sort of set-up will be perfectly adequate for allowing individual pupils or teachers to talk to each other over the Internet, or for small groups of pupils who can gather around the computer in the classroom.

Additional features come with higher-quality equipment. Two useful options are the ability to set up a conferencing session between multiple users, or to transmit additional data, such as diagrams or presentations. The iChat software included with Apple computers is capable of creating a four-way video conference, which could be very useful for teacher meetings. If you don’t use Macs then you may need to invest in additional software, such as PVX from video-conferencing specialists, Polycom.

The PVX software costs £100 per copy, but it does allow you to display documents such as presentation slides in a separate window alongside the main video image. This could be useful in a classroom situation or for teacher meetings. The disadvantage of using this sort of software is that you’re still primarily limited to simple person-to-person communication. And, of course, as you try to include more people in the conferencing system you will need more PCs, more webcams and more copies of the conferencing software.

Where do I get the equipment?
You can get a cheaply from anywhere to get you going all you need is a webcam and a microphone. I recommend checking on www.pricerunner.co.uk
you can pick up a webcam for practically nothing.

Also if you really fancy doing a fully integrated web conference which will allow participants to show slides and a whole host of other things then take a look at http://www.webex.com/. With WebEx all the software is on the internet no downloading anything all you pay for is the call cost about 10 pence a minute.

I will post some case studies next week to give you some better ideas of how you could use video-conferencing in the classroom.