Concluding Thoughts
I think the larger the class size, the more helpful it is to have recordings available, as it can minimize office hours traffic by students who stop by to see if ‘anything important’ was covered in the classes that they had missed. Furthermore, students today, who are very familiar with these forms of technology, appreciate having such resources available so they can learn and review the course material when it is convenient for them.
There is certainly a learning curve associated with using the technologies and with becoming comfortable while being filmed. If you think listening to an audio recording of yourself talking sounds strange, wait until you watch yourself on video! I found myself acting ‘stiff’, more concerned about my appearance, and talking more slowly (which was probably good) than normal. As long as a course is similar from semester to semester, one complete course videotaping will last; this year I do not anticipate recording any of my courses.
So far I have not encountered any copyright issues, but I largely use my own teaching materials in class. I will more likely face such issues should I ever change universities. I used university resources (including staff and student employees) to create the videos, so my current university might object to my using the materials elsewhere.
I am glad that I have embarked on this journey: I have audio-taped and/or video-taped three different courses (all at least twice). Videos can be a great resource for students; whether or not they make use of the resource is up to them. Ultimately, I am happy with the progress I have made towards incorporating audio and video resources into the education process. There are likely to be many more reasons to create video resources for your students than have been identified in this Postcard; I encourage more lecturers to consider their use.