I am intrigued by this relatively new hype surrounding the Lecture Capture technology in education. I started digging, and I found a couple of producers of nice systems which do the job quite well. The job of recording a lecture, I mean, and providing students with an easy access point to the lectures they *missed* or they want to review.
I was buzzed, however, by a strange noise in my ear. Lecture Capture? Nice rhyme, folks, but. But, aren’t we supposed to *change* the lecture metaphor into some new educational framework? Do we not talk about student centered education?
So, this post from Tony Bates hit me:
However, as I have said in other posts (Laptops in lectures, More on laptops in lectures), I question the assumption of giving traditional lectures in the first place, at least as the ‘default’ teaching model. Wrong teaching model for the skills needed in the 21st century. So lectures should not be captured but let go!
Let me state it again, this time in boldface: Sometimes I wonder whether we, the faculty, are the real bottlenecks of education. “Lectures should not be captured but let go!”
Now that we’re talking about lectures, I find myself in full agreement with Bates on the other face of the same token, namely whether laptops should or should not be used within a classroom. Bates says that when they are not really needed of course they should be shut down. However, he adds that was not the real question. More important is to ask:
Why is not the instructor making use of the fact that students have the technology? [my bold] If students have relevant, related activities to do, such as searching for resources, online articles, or connections with other scholars or students, then it would be perfectly legitimate for them to be using their laptops in class.
Then he continues with his powerful logic to demolish the belief that students need to be physically present within a classroom to get an education…
