Videoconferencing:

Real-Time, Real Learning

by Kirk deFord Videoconferencing Graphic

There are about 20,000 videoconferencing stations in K–12 classrooms and schools across the nation. Educators are increasingly finding interactive videoconferencing (IVC) as another valuable teaching and professional development tool. The technology enables them to engage students in Real-Time experiences with others in far-off places and makes it possible for teachers to "meet" with other, geographically dispersed professionals.

Videoconferencing is a live, two-way, interactive electronic means of communication. Two or more people in different geographic locations can engage in face-to-face audio and visual exchanges using cameras, monitors, and computer software.

To share ideas and find out just how IVC is being used today, nearly 100 K–12 educators from 31 states gathered at a symposium at the Infomart in Dallas, Texas, October 17–18. The symposium was part of the Regional Technology in Education Consortia’s (RTEC) National K–12 Interactive Videoconferencing Project.

The project’s primary goal is to survey IVC users to identify how they are using the technology and to create a database of best practices. Also, with input from symposium participants, policy guidelines are now being developed for the use of IVC technology in K–12 settings.

Interactive videoconferencing allows, for example, students to interview NASA astronauts; learn about watersheds in local or remote geographic areas; or participate in a Carnegie Hall-produced, music-making workshop with expert musicians and students their own age from around the world. Groups of students in rural or remote areas can take classes in mathematics, language, and other curricular areas when distance is a factor.

Furthermore, teachers, coaches, bus drivers, and other school groups separated by distance can meet through videoconferencing for inservice sessions or other professional development events.

While the Northwest Educational Technology Consortium (NETC) was the primary organizer of this first-ever symposium focusing on K–12 interactive videoconferencing, this was a collaborative effort with strong support from the Northeast and Islands Regional Technology in Education Consortium in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the South Central Technology in Education Consortium in Austin, Texas.

Keynote speakers shared the latest news and progress in IVC content development, infrastructure, and policy. Stan Silverman, director of technology-based learning for New York Institute of Technology, was one of the speakers, along with Ken Klingenstein of Internet 2. Internet 2 is a partnership of 200 universities, the technology industry, and government that facilitates projects that explore the ways in which advanced network applications, services, tools, and digital content can extend people’s access to education and resources.

Attendees also heard from John Bailey, director of the Office of Educational Technology for the U.S. Department of Education and former director of educational technology for the Pennsylvania Department of Education, and Michael Moore, editor of The American Journal of Distance Education and coauthor of Web-Based Communications, the Internet, and Distance Education (The American Center for the Study of Distance Education, 2000).

Three panels of experienced IVC users discussed the possibilities and challenges of using IVC technology in K–12 settings. Additionally, in small-group sessions, participants discussed pressing issues about IVC in education: content development, the creation of an IVC event clearinghouse, student assessment, project evaluation, teacher training, policies, and technical support for teachers and students. The groups drafted "next steps" for developing training and infrastructure to support IVC users:

Foster a "community of practice" among IVC users
Develop and publish planning guidelines, procedural advice, professional development guidelines, and policy statements
Develop the national database of IVC best practices
Develop a research agenda in the use and evaluation of IVC as it relates to the No Child Left Behind Act
Expand the IVC project Web site http://neirtec.terc.edu/k12vc/

"I really learned so much about what I can do with this hardware. I am going back to my district to try some of these new ideas," said one participant at the conclusion of the symposium. Another noted: "This is the first time there has ever been a conference for the use of videoconferencing in schools. Corporations have been doing this for years, and it is about time that education started using videoconferencing to its full potential."

The Regional Technology in Education Consortia collaborators plan to create a set of practical resources to help educators use interactive videoconferencing in K–12 settings successfully.

For more information about the National K–12 Interactive Videoconferencing Project, go to the Web site, http://neirtec.terc.edu/k12vc/, or contact NETC’s Kirk deFord at 503-275-9490 or by e-mail, defordk@nwrel.org.

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