Alex: I am glad that you chimed into this discussion. It is always great to have a fellow communicators. Are you most of a generalist or more into post production. Part of my dissertation dealt with utilizing entertainment techniques so that professors' classrooms can be transformed to location sets. Your empty room in analogous to working in a studio with remote cameras which I have done quite a few times. I have maintained that professors of the future will need acting, speech delivery and technology backgrounds to effective and maintain interest. I would definitely like to speak to you offline because one of my colleagues was from the Virgin Islands and just graduated. I am interested in visiting (after Hurricane season preferably) to see how your distance learning works. Please email me and I will give you my private address. Chris -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Alex -Vipowernet Sent: Wednesday, May 23, 2007 10:19 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Technology Transforming Education I teach Communication on two islands at once. Using video teleconferencing systems, I hold class on St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands with a video teleconference link to our St Croix campus which is 50 miles away over open ocean. This is extraordinary. While most of the class experience is easily transmitted over the Video link, and I make extensive use of the e-Blackboard - there are oddities. I had a class this semester with 12 students on the distant campus and none on my local campus. So I taught a full semester to an EMPTY ROOM, talking to a camera and watching my students on the distant campus on a video screen. Odd, but entirely workable. I did feel odd waving my arms and gesticulating in an empty room. The only really serious limitation has been when teaching a class that is software intensive... I had a class on video editing and really felt the difficulty trying to show students the software. I could go to my local students and look over their shoulders and point to things on the screen, but the distant students had to do that using NetMeeting - decidedly inferior. Also it is a lot harder to demo and showcase software using the VTC system. The scan rates of NetMeeting prevent live demos of some video features. Other than that, if one is able to use Blackboard and LISTSERV software, the distant learning is a breeze... My classes are all E-classes. No paper. and I am moving toward no books. My CMC class this fall will be entirely electronic with no paper or books. Alex Randall Professor of Communication University of the Virgin Islands. ----- Original Message ----- From: Michael Baron To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Sent: Wednesday, May 23, 2007 12:41 AM Subject: Re: [Air-l] Technology Transforming Education I think the core teaching skills remain the same. It is only the delivery methods that evolve over the time. I see evolution of the classrooms as normal. The world is changing and the education industry is chaging with it. _______________________________________________ The air-l@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/