Volume Two - Academic Conferences

Paul Newbury et al.
“The slides are always very clear and understandable and it is easy to see what the
things we need to know are.”
“If you didn't quite catch something that was said or don't fully understand it, you can go
back and watch it again online rather than stop the lecture mid-flow and ask them to
repeat it.”
“They are an excellent resource - at revision they will be so much more useful than just
slides and audio.”
“You get to hear and see the full explanation of the slides and this is much more
interesting than podcasts or StudyDirect videos.” (N.B. StudyDirect video is captured
using Echo360.)
3.3 Faculty feedback
Those taking part in both the MTL studio and the Echo360 recordings found them a rewarding
experience, although some faculty found the familiar setting of the standard lecture theatre with
Echo360 setup less intimidating. However, the Echo360 capture was often frustrating and on several
occasions the video failed to record leaving just an audio and slides recording of the lecture. An
unexpected consequence of this work was the ability for a lecturer to review their own lectures,
something they found very useful when revising, updating and improving the delivery of the material.
Faculty do not normally get the opportunity to view their own lectures and modify their delivery based
on this view and they were very engaged with this aspect of the trial. Faculty were also very positive
about the required changes in material perpetration from text to more multimedia based teaching and
felt that having to think about reducing text and increasing graphics improved the lecture material
significantly. The faculty impression of the students’ engagement was that they were more interested
by the material recorded in the MTL and were excited by the studio atmosphere. Inattention issues
were reduced and there were no issues with disruptive behaviour.
3.4 Attendance figures
Although only limited research has been performed on the effect of lecture recording on student
attendance (Bradley 2009, Traphagan 2009, Harpp 2004) it is a commonly expressed concern that
providing recordings of lectures is likely to have a detrimental effect on attendance. The common
question “Why would students attend lectures when they could watch the lecture at home” is often
posed. However, previous research suggests that provision of podcast material has limited effect on
attendance (Traphagan 2009, Harp 2004). In cases where there is a drop in attendance this is often
not converted into a drop in student achievement in the course as the additional support material
alleviates this issue (Harp 2004). Although the enhanced digital media created in this research could
be considered more likely than standard podcast technologies to result in a drop in attendance the
results were found to be broadly in-line with previous studies. Attendance is taken at all lecture and
laboratory sessions. The percentage attendance figures for the above 3 years of courses can be seen
in Figure 11.
70
65
60
55
50
Figure 11: Percentage attendance figures
Static Slides 07/08
MTL Video 08/09
Echo360 09/10
Several factors affect attendance on courses from year to year. One of the key factors in attendance
on the above course was the move to lecture slots earlier in the day for the 08/09 cohort. This may
well be the reason for the slight drop in attendance at this point. The 09/10 cohort has the same
lecture times as 08/09 and attendance has rallied slightly. Although a small subset to extrapolate
from, it seems that attendance has not been affected significantly by the studio-based videoing of the
lectures. When students on courses with access to the studio recordings were anonymously asked
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