Auckland University is going to stream lectures over the next few years. To me, this is trouble.
As a response to over-crowding, Auckland University is moving towards streaming lectures. My feeling towards streaming lectures is a bit negative. It’s not a way to maximize the online medium. It’s just trying to copy the classroom to the online experience which has been shown to be ineffective. Now, I’m not against streaming or video. I feel streaming can be effective is short bits — I enjoy watching the latest iPod commercial online, but not a long film. With Internet2, video conferencing can be very effective and a great way to collaborate — but note the 2-way interaction there. It’s not clear from the short article that there will be a component of interaction as well.
Also, their goal is to deal with a problem of over-crowded lecture halls — I’m not sure technology is the answer. Is it helping the students learn better? Or just helping the institution generate out more enrollments? Maybe it would be better to re-examine the structure of the courses and completely revise them.
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