Lectopia @ UWA - Teaching and Learning Context

The main driving force behind creating Lectopia was the desire to make lectures and associated material more available to all students, at the time of their choice. Increasing student access to their learning materials and providing them with flexibility remains the focus of Lectopia.

In a recent Lectopia student survey, information was gathered regarding student motivations for using lecture recordings:

to seek clarification on lecture material and to revise for examinations
to manage timetable difficulties where there are occasional clashes in scheduling
to balance work or family commitments with study demands
to access critical course materials when living in a remote area

Interestingly, a number of students commented that they preferred the Lectopia format; but these students reported that they continued to attend face-to-face lectures because they valued other aspects of the lecture, including relationship-building with their peers.

Many groups of students have acknowledged considerable benefits from Lectopia, in particular:

students in remote and off-shore teaching centres
part-time students, and those working full-time
students with English as a second language
students with disabilities who have difficulty attending face-to-face lectures

Students have overwhelmingly welcomed the increased flexibility and accessibility that Lectopia provides, but there are also clear benefits for teaching staff. Since it was first used in 1999, teaching staff using the Lectopia system have acknowledged the following benefits of providing lecture material to students online:

students use the recordings as reference points, as platforms for further study
students are less likely to ask repetitive questions about material covered in lectures
accessing one's own lectures provides the opportunity for self-review
student feedback about the lecture can be collected using the Lecture Rating feature
listening to previous year’s lectures can be useful when preparing new or revised lectures
previous years' lectures are accessible in case of illness or other unplanned disruptions

A concern that many staff have is that lecture attendance significantly decreases once Lectopia is used; however, staff have noted that the drop in attendance is minimal, with some noting no change in attendance figures and others reporting around a 5-10% reduction.

There are five main Lectopia recording options, all of which aim to provide a valuable learning resource to students following the conclusion of the live lecture.

Audio - the lecturer's voice is the most essential element of any lecture, and it is therefore critical that a lecture's audio is clearly captured during a recording via the venue microphones. Audio-only recordings are the most common Lectopia recordings at UWA.
Video footage - if video footage is shown in a lecture, this can be captured using Lectopia to accompany the audio recording and provide visual context for students accessing the lectures online.
Screen Capture (or VGA) - Screen Capture captures everything on your computer screen during the presentation as you deliver it live. This is a great feature for students as you can capture PowerPoint, web sites, etc. The Lectopia team expects Screen Capture to become the dominant form of recording in the near future.
Visualiser (Document Camera) - Lectopia has the ability to capture video from the venue's visualiser/document camera. This means that any 3D objects, photographs, transparencies, sheets of text and other images placed on the visualiser will be recorded for students to access whilst listening to the synchronised audio. This recording option is ideal for lectures featuring complex calculations, experiments, and/or images/photographs.
Video - at UWA Lectopia is rarely used to capture 'talking-head' video, i.e. video of the lecturer him/herself giving the lecture. The system can be set-up to record from a remote video camera but this is more often managed by the Lectopia team on a manual basis, given that this usage is very low at UWA.

In addition to the above recording options, lecturers can choose to upload materials, such as PowerPoint slides, to accompany the online recording. This provides yet another dimension to the Lectopia service.

Examples of the different recording options can be accessed on the Lectopia Examples page.