Dave Peterson, one of Centralia College’s recognized innovators, teaches Electronics, Robotics and Industrial Automation. Dave says “this includes technical math specifically for electronics, like circuit analysis, graphing and data visualization, and trigonometry applications.”
If you know anything about Dave Peterson, you know he’s no stranger to innovation. He builds robots, for crying out loud. In addition to being one of the youngest instructors to be accepted to tenure track at Centralia College, he helped students of the college’s physics and electronics club launch a “near space vehicle” 90,000 feet into the air carrying data recording equipment during the summer of 2013.
Interestingly enough, he isn’t being recognized for his obvious innovations like those listed above. eLearning is recognizing Dave for his innovations in the classroom that engage students and help them to be even more successful.
In his own words:
The main initiative that we are working on this year is optimizing a lecture capture method tries to best re-create the classroom experience for students who are not able to attend as often. A good percentage of our students have either long commutes or full time jobs which would normally be a huge inconvenience, if not making it altogether impossible to get the training. By making our lectures available online, we can customize the schedules for each person and remove that ‘mandatory confirmation’ to our traditional day or night schedule. Since neither one works for every person.
The main kinds of things we are working on include a heavy integration of Canvas for immediate feedback and thorough description of assignments. Each homework, lab, study guide, etc is outlined in as much detail as possible. The point distribution is also made entirely clear so that time and resource management can be factored in to the right assignments (if something is worth more, they know to budget time accordingly). Also, many students are willing to work ahead as their time allows, and a through use of Canvas assignments allows them to look ahead at future assignments.
Another innovation is whiteboard capturing and recording. The Panopto platform allows simultaneous recording of the computer screen as well as a thumbnail video of the presenter (via a webcam). We use a device called a MimioTeach, which is a magnetic pen tracker that mounts to a standard 8’ whiteboard. The virtual pens are loaded with normal whiteboard markers, so the presenter uses the whiteboard as they normally would. The MimioTeach tracks all motion with a respectable degree of precision, and this is displayed on the PC. Through Panopto, every whiteboard action is recorded alongside the presenter video.
Since they are recorded as opposed to ‘live’ webcasts, the students can then watch at their own leisure, and are free to ask questions through Canvas which can be easily answered the following class period.
In addition to the whiteboard, any PC programs used through the class will also be recorded. In math classes, a heavy emphasis on problem solving through Microsoft Excel is used, including some fairly advanced functions, such as drop-down menus, conditional statements and macros. In Electronics and Robotics, computer simulation software is commonplace, and the screen recording can greatly aid in learning. The video casting features allows students to skip, pause and rewind to review these complicated concepts and try their own variations.
I am always surprised at how little extra work this requires. In the old system, Tegrity, the process allowed a presenter to record right from the desktop application and place the video right into the corresponding Canvas classroom. The same concept is still possible with the Panopto system, and also allows the videos to be either recorded onto the computer, or recorded directly onto the online server.
Students have also reported fewer issues with viewing the videos on Panopto. Since the beginning of Fall 2014, I have only encountered one instance of an incompatible browser plugin, and that was fixed quite easily by following some instructions on the Panopto site. I’m sure there are more reported, but it seems very accessible by the students.
The recordings are imitated with not much more than clicking the “start new recording’ link, providing a descriptive name for the lecture and pressing ‘record’. At the end of the recording after pressing stop, a couple clicks of the mouse sends the video directly to the Canvas page. It couldn’t be much simpler, and I am very impressed with the quality.
There are many variables that affect the performance of a particular class, perhaps nothing more significantly than just the students’ drive and motivation to succeed. But even considering those dynamics, we have observed a dramatic increase in performance through the entire class, with 100% participation and assignment completion in several classes – a landmark that has never been seen before. The students are interacting and participating much more than ever seen before, and I attribute that in large part to our innovations in bringing the classroom home to the students so they have the ability to revisit the day at school whenever they want.
This is definitely just the beginning of Dave’s innovations and we will be looking forward to the wonderful ideas that come from him and his class. Congratulations Dave!
Teaching and Learning @ Centralia College 