Lest We Forget: Vietnam War

Today we have several local schools as well as two schools from Pennsylvania interviewing four of our local Vietnam veterans. This is the last in our series of Lest We Forget videoconferences. Students viewed a video produced locally with experiences from our veterans, prepared good questions, and then participated in the videoconference. Here are some of the questions the students asked:

  • Can you explain your first 24 hours in Vietnam?
  • How did you feel about the war protests?
  • Do you think there are similarities between the war in Iraq and the Vietnam War? If so what are they?
  • What did you miss about home when you were overseas? Do you agree with the reasons for starting the war?
  • Describe your accommodations.
  • Did you volunteer or were you drafted?
  • What kind of reaction did you have when you returned to the U.S.?

The classes that participated today really appreciated the experience. These interviews make history come alive for students as they learn the personal experiences of those who have served our country.

This is my last videoconference for the school year. My schools are doing a couple more on their own, but we’re basically done for the year. It’s been fun sharing these programs with you. I hope you’ve been inspired to do more videoconferences in your area, and maybe we can connect our classes together next year! Maybe you’ll start blogging your VCs too so we can learn from you!

Author Ben Mikaelsen

Between Friday and today we have three sessions with Author Ben Mikaelsen for Coloma Middle School. Since it costs so much we obtained permission to have several other schools connect as view only sites as well.

Students realize very quickly into the session that Ben is a master storyteller, not only in words but in person too! He tells the story of growing up in Bolivia, of integration into an American junior high in Minnesota, and of his experience not being able to spell. His story is inspiring to all students, no matter their skill level.

Ben also tells stories about his bear and the adventures they have together. He draws several lessons on dealing with bullies, following your dreams, and getting along with others.

Finally after the presentation, students asked great questions. One of the teachers said afterwards, "The presentation was very complete and thorough. The kids loved the session."

The program is a tad expensive, but authors have to eat too! If you have a budget for bringing in authors, this program is well worth it. 

Megaconference Jr. Magic

Here are some more highlights from today's Megaconference Jr.

Megaconference Jr. is facilitated mainly by student VJs. It's a great opportunity for these students to practice and showcase their communication and presentation skills.

Here's a picture of the students from Riverview Elementary School giving clues about their location in the Rainy River District. There were quite a few "where are we" type presentations and clues today which made it more interesting and engaging for classes watching.

This picture shows University School in Ohio sharing information about space science simulations. I really liked the layout used here as the presenting students took questions from the 5 interactive sites assigned to their session. In past Megaconferences I have really enjoyed the roll calls even though they can be fairly chaotic. So I was disappointed at first when I saw the schedule for this year's Megaconference Jr. But I have changed my mind! I think the 5 interactive sites per session has worked very well and shown everyone the true possibilities for student-to-student project connections.

Here's another example of the interaction during sessions. This class did a Jeopardy game as you can see in the picture.

Megaconference Jr. is always an amazing experience and a learning experience for videoconferencing etiquette. This year 235 sites are connected and there's always some weird glitches due to mics not being muted and people not paying attention to their site that is connected. It's a good way to learn what NOT to do in a videoconference. It's also a good way to learn to keep going no matter what! I was pleased to see that the presenters and VJs were well trained to keep going no matter who popped in and interrupted the program!

Another neat new feature this year is Virtual Postcards. But they aren't web-based as I first thought upon hearing the name. To leave a postcard, you dial into the IP address given at one of the times listed and record your session with the assistance of a technician. It's a video postcard! Recorded using your endpoint! How cool is that! To view the postcards you dial into another IP address and you can select the postcards from a menu.

I would sure like to know what type of technology is behind that. I'm suspecting a Codian but I'm not sure. Do any of you know? Leave a comment!

Kudos to the Megaconference Jr. team of volunteers. It takes so much work to make a big event like this happen! And we participants sure appreciate all the labor & love that goes into this project! The impact on student global understanding is incredible! 

Are You Watching Megaconference Jr.?

Are you watching or participating in Megaconference Jr. today? Here are a few highlights from today already.

Kuo Kwang High School in Taiwan shared some wonderful little skits on topics such as the Moon Festival and a day in the life of a Taiwanese student. Their presentation gave them a chance to practice English and show off their understanding of words and puns. It was a delight to watch!

Young students at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras/Chennai shared learning games and other fun activities with the sites interactive with their presentation. They played a game of Duck Duck Goose, and we saw an interactive class in Ireland share one of their games too. The classes also tossed a virtual ball back and forth between India, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania.

Another presentation shared a couple of beautiful Chinese dances from a dance school in Minnesota.

I'll post more later, but if you're not connected via videoconference, you should watch via streaming. 

K12 Videoconferencing Trends

I've been working on my end of the year reports on use of distance learning in our 18 school districts, and I'm noticing some interesting trends. Based on my conversations with other videoconferencing colleagues, my sense is that these trends are true across the U.S. as well.

More Programs, Less District Financial Input
The usage in all districts increased this year, except for two districts whose equipment wasn’t working. Our student connections (content provider programs & projects) increased 86% over last year. While the programs increased, the amount of $$ districts contributed to programming stayed about the same. Districts have less funding for programming and field trips of any kind. However, they are also realizing the power & value of classroom-to-classroom projects.

Projects Are On the Rise
52% of the programs my districts did this year were completely free. There was no cost to the district or the ISD and they were via IP so we had no ISDN line charges. Most of these were classroom-to-classroom projects. Some of them were ASK programs that we offered to our schools, interviewing local experts who didn't charge for their time. Obviously with tight budgets, free programs are an essential component to a successful distance learning program.

Mobile & Cheaper Equipment Increases Access
Building access to the equipment made a huge difference in use. A couple of our districts switched to a mobile unit (within the district). They just carry the Polycom, mic, and remote from school building to school building. Within the building or classroom, they hook the Polycom to whatever is in the classroom – sometimes a projector, sometimes a TV. A couple other districts purchased additional Polycoms for their buildings. In both scenarios, the district use of videoconferencing increased dramatically. Even in one of the districts where their T1 bandwidth is maxed out all the time, and the picture quality is less than desirable, they've been using it more & teachers have been happy with the results because of the tight curriculum focus of the programs and the access in their classroom.

Regional Service Agency Support is Essential
As a regional service agency I'm providing more programs to my districts. Some of them cost money to provide (such as Author ASK programs), and some of them just cost time & effort (such as MysteryQuest). These opportunities also contribute to the increase in usage in my districts. See my previous blog entry about providing programs for your districts for more details.

Teacher Path to Creating Projects
Alan Greenberg and Russ Colbert, in their October 2003 publication, Best Practices in Live Content Acquisition, suggest that schools start by using videoconferencing within the district/consortium, then add access content from various providers, and finally at stage three they begin delivering programs. Based on this article and my own experience, I have believed that teachers had to experience a videoconference with a content provider before they were ready to do a project with another class. My perception on this is changing. I've had several teachers this year (who had never done a videoconference before) come up with a great project and successfully plan it with a partner class. Some examples from this year include: Math & Robots, ESL Exchange, and many of the Read Across America connections. Part of their success has definitely been local media specialist support as well as ideas & suggestions from me.

Continued Barriers
Lest you think that all is pie in the sky in my neck of the woods, some of my districts still aren't using videoconferencing as much as they could. There are three main barriers that continue to challenge us.

  • Bandwidth. The majority of my districts have just one T1 line to us (we provide their Internet access). Between old routers and busy networks, quality of VCs has degraded in most of my districts since we switched from V.35 to IP. However, the teachers who are committed to and interested in the quality of the content don't seem to mind the degraded quality of the video as the students are still learning from it.
  • Local Building Support. One of the major contributing factors to the use of distance learning continues to be the local building media specialist, teacher, or tech who is my distance learning contact. I've noticed a direct correlation between the distance learning contact taking my online classes (Planning Interactive Curriculum Connections & Kid2Kid Videoconference Connections) and the district or building's total videoconferences for this year. Having a trained local contact is essential to the success of our program.
  • Access in the Building. My teachers are definitely tired of getting on a bus to go to the high school to use distance learning. It worked in the first few years of our initial installation, but with tight budgets (no money!) and tight curriculum schedules (no time!), the hassle of transportation to the high school is not worth it. We are slowly overcoming this with a USDA RUS DLT grant installing 35 new Polycoms this summer. Half of my buildings are not eligible for this grant due to their rurality scores, and those districts are overcoming the access issue by purchasing more Polycoms or switching to a mobile Polycom.

Do you see these same trends in your district/region's use of videoconferencing? How are you addressing these issues in your area? Leave a comment!

Atmospheric Adventures

Today Berrien Springs Middle School is participating in four sessions of Atmospheric Adventures with COSI Toledo, one of our favorite science museums.

Students are immediately engaged in conversation and interaction that helps them realize that Andy, the presenter, can actually see them! It’s a great way to start VCs and helps break the ice for classes that are new to videoconferencing. They are immediately put at ease and are ready to learn.

During the program, Andy calls on volunteers to try out various experiments that help to explain concepts such as air pressure and how it interacts with matter & gravity.

One of the ways I evaluate a program when I’m watching the program is the posture of the students. If they are sitting up & leaning forward, you know they are engaged & interested in the program! You should definitely plan to do a program with COSI Toledo sometime next year if you haven’t already…

Aztec, Maya and More

In the last three weeks we’ve had three schools participate in 7 sessions of Aztec, Maya, and More with The Cleveland Museum of Art. This program tightly matches our 6th grade curriculum as students are studying the Western Hemisphere.

The program starts off right away with great interaction. With many questions, students are encouraged to think carefully about what we can learn about people from the sculpture they are viewing.

As you can see in the picture, The Cleveland Museum of Art, uses a very cool technology: the green screen, just as the weatherman does! This definitely adds to the quality of the program and the way students feel connected to the presenter & engaged in the content.

The presenter is willing to adapt the program based on what the teacher requests. The Cleveland Museum of Art has much (most or all?) of their collection digitized and they can easily bring up additional images based on the teachers’ preference.
Here are some comments from two of the teachers who participated:

“The presenter was awesome with my kids! She answered even their questions about how the video conference was done. She gave background on the museum, and was very patient even with some of the not-so-bright answers my kids gave. We learned so much, and my students loved it!”

” The gal was very helpful, patient, and flexible with lines of questioning. Next best thing to being there! My kids had a blast! Students enjoyed interacting with the speaker. They got to ask questions as well as answer them. The more the students participated the more they got out of the program. This program is good for an introduction of the subject or as a review to finish the topic. I’m very happy I did this videoconferencing.”

H.323 on a Mac

Here’s an interesting blog entry from Wesley Fryer, an educator in Texas, on XMeeting, open source software for connecting to H.323 sites and conferences from the Mac. He has included screen shots so we can see how the program works. Looks promising!

Musical Geography of America

This afternoon E. P. Clarke Elementary, St. Joseph is connecting to the Cleveland Institute of Music for their Musical Geography of America program.

The program starts off with questions right away to get students engaged and interacting. Students answer questions that test their understanding of the regions of the U.S., borders and large bodies of water, major goods and services from the various regions, etc. The students also got a peek at their school compliments of Google Earth!

Students listen to different kinds of music including a hymn, a Native American melody, jazz, and mariachi.

During the program, the students play a Native American melody on plastic flutes and rattle the rhythm sticks with the mariachi music.

The program also includes references to American history events & people such as Lewis & Clark and slavery.

The 3rd grade teachers at Clarke appreciate this program and integrate it into their spring curriculum annually. There is a lot of variety in the program and it keeps the students engaged as they learn about U.S. geography and regions.

Troubleshooting an IP call

Yesterday I spent quite a bit of time helping one of our school district troubleshoot an IP call. Here are some of the things we tried.

Check the IP Address
One of the first things to check is the IP address that the other location gave you to dial. In this case, the first number they gave us was a 10.10.xxx.xxx number. Any number that starts with a 10 or 172 is an internal IP address and so you know up front that you can't dial that number if you are not on their network. When this happens, ask the other location to give you an "external IP address" to dial.

How have other connections worked?
The next investigation is how can both sides connect? Ask yourself and the other location – where else can I connect that it works? Can I connect with other places outside my network? Has it been tested recently with another location? In sorting through this conversation, we discovered that both locations could only place IP calls. Neither could receive. So then we set up a connection on my bridge so the two places could call in and meet each other there.

Partial Connections
Next we discovered that we were getting video & audio from the other location, but they couldn't see or hear us. They were seeing a black screen. This is a red flag for firewall problems. It's VERY common (at least in my experience) to have the connection work almost all the way, but one or two parts are missing. Often the firewall lets the call connect, but doesn't allow the incoming audio & video. At this point you ask the other site to check the ports on their firewall or ask them if they've successfully connected to someone else outside their network.

On this particular call, we gave up on IP and went to ISDN. That was as much of a challenge as they gave us three numbers for a switched call. We ended up making it work with a 2×64 call and I bridged it from myPolycom VSX 7000. Thankfully the connection went well.