Today on twitter someone asked me which virtual classroom (VC) I used and I had a list for him/her as I use several. I even confessed that I truly haven't decided on a favorite as they all have their pros and cons based on the students and platform that I am using. At LANCELOT School, we try to familiarize the trainees with at least five virtual classroom solutions so that when faced with a client they can choose the one that is the most appropriate for their needs or if they go into a client's VC they can usually adapt to the new solution quite quickly. Here is a list of the ones that I use:
Free VCs I use:
Adobe Connect Now
This is free for three people. Screensharing is great. Annotation tools can be used with screensharing (the only room). All cameras can be seen at the same time.
Digital Samba
This is free for three people. All cameras can be used at the same time. One of the few VCs that allows word documents to be uploaded.
DimDim
This is free for up to 20 people. Only the host can share the web camera. Web touring and Screen sharing is really quite good. One drawback is that you can't upload jpegs.
Elluminate
This is free for three people. This is the best for low-bandwidth. Has web-touring, clock, and break-out rooms, which is awesome. The whiteboard tools are also really great. I especially like the ability to use the clock, which no other VC has. All three cameras can be seen at the same time and up to six cameras can be used with the professional version.
Spreed
This is free for up to three people. All cameras can be seen at the same time. One of the few that allows word documents to be uploaded. As far as I know the only VC with a mindmap tool, which is really cool. Like most flash-based systems, it is best with high band-width.
Webtrain
This is free for two people. Good for low-bandwidth, web touring, wonderful whiteboard tools, remote control, only one camera can be seen at a time.
Paid VCs I use:
Adobe Connect Pro
One of the more expensive VCs on the market and I jump at the chance to use it. Like most flash based solutions it is best for high bandwidth. It has polls, breakout rooms, whiteboarding, screensharing, filesharing and all participants can be seen on camera if everyone has one.
Instant Presenter
I have found this VC to be the easiest for people with low technical skills to enter and to navigate. Six people can be on the camera and VOIP at the same time. Screensharing, polls and whiteboarding are quite easy to use. It is a very basic VC, but quite good.
11 comments:
That's very interesting reading, even some I'd never heard of, I'll check them out and thanks for sharing. Btw what's your name in second life?
Hi Holly,
Thank you for sharing this and allow me to add just a few little 'idiosynchrosies' that each of them have. These kind of oddities will only become apparent if you use these virtual classrooms at length and find out their litte knick-knacks. :-)
Adobe Connect Now is a resource eater. It is almost as bad as Second Life, many people's computers are not fast enough to handle Adobe Connect Now BUT it is utmost beautifully designed and very slick and hugely effective in one-to-one tuition in companies.
DimDim does is very commercial for being open-source and not many people know that there is a charge on the higher end of the service. Good so too because it is worth the effort that developers put into this. Idiosynchrosies? Not many really. No 'undo' nor any 'clear' button in the drawing tools, so, whatever spello there is, you are stuck.
Elluminate
FABULOUS tool, works ever so well in many countries (it's actually the only one I found to work in China) - BUT - needs to be installed. Once installed, it is unbeatably fully-featured and works ever so well. Only set-back (if one can find at all) is the extremely dull grey look and feel that has not changed in donkey-years. I believe can could do with a coat of paint.
Spreed is the most beautiful solution out there, very well designed but has a problem with screen resolutions. Somebody with a higher screen resolution (TFT) may see things that somebody with lower screen resolution (laptop for example) may not. This is because their whiteboard somehow does not start at the top in different screens. Weird programming.
WebTrain has a great look and feel and a fabulous co-browsing function but is a handful when it comes to the voice over IP. Very difficult to handle mic modus (left click) versus headset modus (right click) and especially the echo-cancellation feature that renders a TALK button inactive if somebody has not confirmed in the settings that he/ she is using a headset. The one clever thing here is, that it now installs into the temporary folder of the browser, hence people without installation rights can now join.
Adobe Connect Pro is the Mercedes of the industry but a bandwidth eater and it is difficult for several people to synchronously use the drawing tools, also the slide forwarding that just starts out of no apparent reason at times but don't we just love to see several webcams at once. It seems to make all the difference!
Instant Presenter has a maximum 6 simulataneous speakers in a 15 concurrent user room and it has a very poor whiteboard and the drawing tools are rough/tough. What is also sad is that a person who wishes to talk needs to switch on the webcam at the same time and if he hasn't got one, then the audience sees a grey area displayed. The flash player gets them both started at the same time but at least in Adobe you can disable the webcam if you don’t have it or at least it shows a black box with a grey profile in it.
Am not too familiar with Digital Samba, as in, have not used it at length to find out the idiosynchrosies of which.
Hello,
this is a nice collection of virtual classrooms. I just started to describe various systems, but only in german languge - maybe some german speaking readers will show up (what about you Heike?) : http://clot.mixxt.de/networks/content/index.aaa
Josh,
Thanks for your comments, but I beg to differ. When teaching a language live online there is a lot more involved than just showing documents! The students use the whiteboard, we screenshare, we web-browse, etc. You might be talking about web-conference solutions for corporates--I'm talking about teaching a language.
What a wonderful posting from a professional! So much practical info for rookies like me - thank you Holly. And thanks to all the commenters who have shared their expertise as well.
Really interesting rundown. I was just wondering why you didn't include Saba Centra, though? It's quite widely used and although it's not great, it does have some good points.
Thanks Wil for your comment. I've never heard of or used Saba centra. Could only write about what I know. Can you give us a rundown? url, etc. Do they offer at least a 30 day free trial? Any free offers for language teachers to try?
Really very intersting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hi,
I found elluminate very good from a classroom application perspective. The look and feel can definitely be made more attractive and pleasing.
You may also want to look at electa, talkbean and voxwire. Both voxwire and electa are quite promising. Vyew is another free application that is quite good too!!
Thanks Sethu for your comments. I have used Vyew just a little and didn't think of it for this post. Thanks for reminding me. It works ever so well for small groups.
I'll have to check into the other ones.
I was wondering if you'd care to add anything to this. It'd help me with my MA and work. Looks like a great blog and I'll be sure to read through the rest.
Best Ed
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AVK1CWvIp_zqZGZ4cWZtdHFfM2RjY3B6ejdo&hl=en_GB
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