Wimba comes to Western
Wimba is a software product that offers synchronous
and asynchronous audio communication within a WebCT
course. Synchronous communication requires the interacting
parties to be using the Wimba Direct Voice (VoIP) tool at
the same time. Asynchronous communication is more flexible.
The Wimba Voice Board tool allows parties to interact at
different times (asynchronously) similar to a textual discussion
board, but with audio.
Faculty and students will need a microphone connected to their
computers to use Wimba, and a java applet needs to be installed
(dial-up modem users should request a Wimba CD for the Java
download). Voice sessions can be archived within the WebCT
course.
IT’s Educational Technologies invited
several of Western's leading distance education faculty to
collaborate on conducting a proof of concept with three different
synchronous audio products recommended by faculty currently
using that technology in online classes.
In the first phase, Educational Technologies staff and the participating faculty
spoke with vendors and interacted in product demonstration sessions over a
one-semester time period. It was decided unanimously that Wimba was the best
choice for this campus at this time.
In the second phase, Educational Technologies purchased a license for Wimba,
and several distance education faculty were then asked to use Wimba in their
active WebCT courses to help develop policies and test tutorials.
Both faculty and students can use Wimba in a variety
of different ways. For instance, faculty members teaching
a fully online course usually depend only on textual content
to deliver materials to their students. With Wimba, these
same faculty members can arrange to have their students meet
online at certain times and use Wimba’s Voice Direct
tool, a synchronous audio chat session, to deliver lectures
and hold discussions with their class.
Students also may take advantage of the voice direct synchronous audio tool
to collaborate with each other as a group to discuss assignments in real time
or to socialize with other members of the course.
Wimba also features a Voice Board feature, an asynchronous
message board that also allows faculty members and students
to post messages with voice recordings attached to them.
This tool can be used by faculty members to conduct threaded
discussions on assignments or even post miniature lectures
for their students to read and/or listen to. Since this tool
is asynchronous, students are free to view, listen, record,
and post messages at their own leisure. Due to this feature,
the Voice Board tool is flexible and accommodating to a larger
group of students.
Fortunately for faculty and students, Wimba is an extremely
easy product to use. Because Wimba exists as a powerlink
with WebCT, Educational Technologies’ course management
software, faculty using WebCT can create new Voice Board
and Voice Direct tools within their WebCT course just as
easily as they can add any other tool. For students, access
is even easier as it requires a single click of a mouse within
their WebCT course.
For more information on WebCT and Wimba, please contact
Traci Settlemyre at 227-3387 or email Settlemyre@email.wcu.edu.
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