Pre-recording a Lecture using GauchoCast: Advice & Considerations for Presenters

The GauchoCast system will blend your audio/video with the material you show on your screen, eg.: slides, an open file, your browser window.
As you prepare to pre-record your lectures for your course,
you may want to consider and act on some of this advice.

What do you want to say?

What do you want your students to take from each prerecorded presentation?

• Many instructors work from a script. Yet spontaneity can have benefits in terms of student engagement, too. See the next section: “Scripted v. Spontaneous Presentations”.

• To maintain focus and purpose, outline the learning outcomes for the presentation, return to one or more along the way, and restate them at the end.

• Apart from content, are there other messages that need to be communicated? Administration? Reminders? Assignment deadlines?

• You can personalize your presentation and foster more student engagement by integrating messages for groups and making references to individuals in the class.

• However, if you plan on re-using the recording for a subsequent course, you may prefer to avoid reminders, messages and local references, and send them out via GauchoSpace or email instead. You could also edit them out of the recording later.

  Your first lecture

• Do you need to set out your interest or background in the subject?

• Key sections of your syllabus: which passages and items in particular?

• Some instructors briefly outline key themes or principles from their Teaching

  Philosophy, so as to give students a sense for how they “operate”.

  Scripted v. Spontaneous presentations

  Scripted presentations:

  By following a script you can ensure you address all your key points. However, scripted presentations can feel “canned” and can sometimes appear a little stilted to viewers/listeners. When you are recording video and following a script, you will lose eye contact with the camera when your eyes drift across to your script.

  Spontaneous presentations:
  Many presenters address brief points in their PowerPoint slides. Spontaneous presentations can come to feel more natural, authentic, and friendly. More digression and story-telling can occur as you become more comfortable with the medium. However, watch the time! Such presentations can tend to run longer than scripted presentations.

  Length of presentation:

  Shorter is better.

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• One long lecture will naturally break into segments, so consider making several 10 minute recordings on different topics. UCSB instructors are finding that 75 min. lectures typically condense into 30-45 minute lectures in this medium.

Format and quality

• Video or audio only? Consider your non-verbal behavior and the “unstated communication” of your on-screen presence. How does your personality come across in video format? Many instructors prefer to use audio only with slides and/or screencast. The voice alone can convey a lot of information.

• Educational recordings do not need to meet TV and movie industry standards. Educational recordings are typically natural and a little “rough around the edges” - and even occasionally eccentric. You need to be prepared to trade perfection for authenticity.

• Be yourself, even if you are talking to a screen. See “Presentation of Self” below.

  What format options will support students who are watching and learning from your recordings? In GauchoCast you can display:

• PowerPoint: You can integrate images and key points, and slides are searchable.

• Screen capture: explore a website, annotate a diagram, draw a process.

• Talking Head window presents you: your facial expressions, with eye contact. You can hold up visuals, write on a board, or conduct an experiment.

• Any combination of the above.

• Do some short test recordings initially. Is it working how you want it to?

  GauchoCast is a powerful visual medium

  You may want to exploit some more creative visual possibilities. Consider breaking up a “talking head” format by integrating some of the following strategies.

• Storytelling

• Pictures, cartoons, video

• Questions for students to discuss, research or reflect on

• Props or an experiment (with camera on)

• Some humor?

• An interview (check you and the interviewee are visible in camera).

  Rehearse! Rehearse!

• Make a few test runs to review your presentation from a student perspective.

• Ask yourself: What will my students be doing at different points in the

  presentation? See “Strategies to Foster Student Engagement” below.

• Check your test runs to make sure that the format, lighting and background are

  as desired.

  Some other technical matters

• Lighting is important. Reposition your webcam so that your face receives front- on sunlight from a window or light source. You my need to add a small study lamp behind your screen, or to one side, to balance or direct more light onto your face.

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• Webcam/camera positioning: like a good passport photo, aim to center your head and shoulders, consider your distance from the camera. Can the viewer see your eyes?

• Background (office, home): consider what “messages” your background environment might be sending. This can be very powerful.

• Screencasting? Tidy up your desktop! Put idle files/desktop downloads in folders. Have the applications and screen you want to show open and ready to pull up on your screen.

  Dress & appearance

• Clothing: Pastel colors work best. Presenters are often advised not to wear white, nor strong patterns, especially in black and white. Geometric patterns and herringbone can pixellate or blur on screen.

• Avoid other distractions, such as metallic or flashy jewelry, pendants and earrings. Be aware that T-shirts with words and messages will be read, and will draw attention to your chest!

• If you wear eyeglasses, try removing them from time to time. Reflective lenses can sometimes interfere with perceived eye contact.

  Presentation of self

• Maintain eye contact with the camera. This is critical. How? Personify it: imagine it is a student; talk to it like you would a person. Some presenters practice talking to inanimate objects, so as to be able to talk to camera.

• Remember to Smile! Use large paper post-its around your screen, or on the wall behind your webcam, for reminders to self about this or other matters.

• Gestures and movement: watch your hands. Are these typical gestures? Is gesticulating your style?

• Voice: listen and check your speech rate, enunciation and voice modulation. Some Strategies to Foster Student Engagement

  Suggestions for student activities before watching a video or video cast

• Small class: Ask your students to email you their questions about the readings

  for you to address in your upcoming presentation.

• Large class: In GauchoSpace, randomly or deliberately create "Lecture Question

  Groups", comprising 5-8 students. In a discussion forum ("standard general use") set to “separate groups”, each group negotiates and finalizes their group’s question online about a specified reading or up-coming lecture topic. On a rotating basis, one person in each group is appointed to post their group’s question (or a 50 word summary, if they have no question) to a main forum (a "one person one post" forum) by a specified date and time. In this way, you can design and adapt your prerecorded lectures to be more responsive to the groups' questions.

• Require students to complete short online reading quizzes each week. Engagement strategies during a video or video cast

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• Ask students make notes in the note-taking screen. At the start of the presentation suggest to students that they make notes, and later copy and paste those viewing notes into a Word or text file.

• Between segments students could also work a multiple choice (short) quiz to test their understanding.

• Give students a checklist of points/definitions/names to check off as they listen to the recording.

• Ask students to complete worksheet, an incomplete copy of the PowerPoint slides, or answer a short list of questions for that session.

• Ask students to write down any questions they have and mail them you after the session (or they could post them to a discussion forum for wider consideration).

• Mention your students' names. Invite and acknowledge their questions and contributions. If you decide do this, mention this practice in your syllabus and in communications to them, and explain why you will do it. Be mindful not to “play favorites”, and consider using other ways of handling, but still responding to questions that come in regularly from the same individuals.

• Work with a second presenter; interview someone.

  Suggestions for student activities after watching a video or video cast

• Students can replay segments of a presentation; use a checklist.

• Students could complete a multiple choice quiz to review the material.

• Discussion Forum suggestion #1: Students are asked to respond, in a standard

  threaded discussion forum, to one or more thought questions. They could be

  encouraged to comment or add to other students' posting(s).

• Discussion Forum suggestion #2: Using a GauchoSpace “Q&A Forum”, students

  are asked to submit a question about the recorded lecture (or an example of a

  concept that was discussed) in advance of the face-to-face class, lab or section.

• Use the GauchoSpace Feedback tool to set up an anonymous survey seeking

  students’ perspectives on which points or elements of the presentation were effective; which points were still “muddy” at the end.