Wednesday, 5 November 2008

Reflection of an online interview

Yesterday I had an online interview with a prospective school. I was excited and nervous as we were going to attempt using an online conference site Dimdim. I thought it would be a good opportunity to show my ICT skills. Before the interview, their ICT teacher spent ages on the phone with me testing out the conference site. It was not going well, I had failed to consider that they had Apple Macs and my browser kept shutting down! I was already impressed with this teacher who went to so much trouble, who was so patient and understood the ICT discourse.

In the end the they could see and hear me on video. I could not see or hear them, so was on my mobile on the webcam. It was not what I had invisioned but we ended up using ICT in a variety of ways to overcome barriers and have a wonderful interview.

Things I would do next time:
  • Use a simpler web conferencing system like AIM or MSN. (KISS)
  • Test, test and test with time to spare.
  • Mention a strength of mine is flexibility when ICT tools crash :-)

Food for thought:
One aspect of online communication even when using video is that it is difficult to tell when someone has finished speaking and is ready for the next person. I think it is a point in case about how much we 'read' from body language. Do we need conventions for passing the speaking ball online, are there already?
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6 comments:

  1. Blogger In Middle-earth5 November 2008 at 10:50

    Kia ora Shaun.

    Thanks for the link to Dimdim. This app is new to me.

    Interesting that you had problems with the browser - what a bother for you!

    What browser were you using? I have found Firefox tends to be more robust for chat and other synch online discourse, more so than any others I've tried, including the latest Chrome.

    Ka kite

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  2. Anonymous5 November 2008 at 11:20

    Kia ora Ken

    It is suppose to be for web conferencing, another is www.mikogo.com. Frankly they are designed for more multi collaboration work, I really should have gone the tried and trusted simple way.

    I agree about Firefox and it's my browser choice too, but strangely Dimdim was crashing Firefox and not Explorer. I haven't tried Chrome yet, from what I've read it needs some development before it can compete with Firefox.

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  3. Mr Lietze6 November 2008 at 20:00

    Hi Shaun
    Great to see you are getting some help from some fellow Kiwi's :+)

    I have tried Dimdim and wengomeeting but found both to be average (the first problem is that the screen pictures of the conference participants are too small).

    I have since been shown Adobe Connect! http://www.adobe.com/acom/connectnow/ I'll be honest to say that I haven't used it yet with our buddy class but do know that you can change the size of the video boxes, add files, use a whiteboard all free and online with this freeware.

    Check it out - you will be impressed.

    Jamin Lietze
    www.lietze.edublogs.org

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  4. Mr Wood11 November 2008 at 12:13

    Thank you Jamin, sorry I been so long in replying, I just have not had a chance to use it until now.

    It really it easy. One web conference room url that is always the same and guests do not have to join anything! The interface is like you said simple and flexible. I look forward to using it more.

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  5. Anonymous27 December 2008 at 21:59

    I liked the conclusion that you were able to use ICT flexibly to make communication happen... and overcome obstacles. That's what it's all about really.

    Thanks for the reflection.

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  6. Blogger In Middle-earth29 December 2008 at 20:05

    Kia ora Shaun

    I have a suspicion you are right about Chrome. I've not had a lot of luck using it I have to admit that. Sometimes it just stops running.

    BTW, recently your latest posts from this blog aren't being picked up by my RSS. I'm gong to have to check this out. I'll let you know.

    Best wishes for the coming year.
    from Middle-earth

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