University of Mary Washington
Providing a single solution for teacher training and supplemental student instruction
A convenient alternative
The University of Mary Washington, located in Fredericksburg, Virginia, 50 miles south of Washington D.C., serves more than 4,000 students. The Division of Teaching and Learning Technologies assists the university in maintaining its commitment to academic excellence by supporting the instructional technology needs of the entire University of Mary Washington community. With instructor-led training already in place, the university recently launched a new training website that provides self-instruction on a variety of different topics.
According to Andrew Rush, a Mary Washington Instructional Technology Specialist, its online training site originally had static text and graphics. Knowing that video was more visually compelling and would create higher retention rates, Rush used a variety of video products to create his five-to-ten-minute videos. "I had previously used a video editing system that made adding complex special effects difficult, and then I needed to use separate publishing and encoding software to create the video. The time it took for me to put one video together using that method was ridiculous," says Rush. "I didn't want and couldn't afford to use multiple products to accomplish one simple video. I wanted an all-in-one solution."
Rush had heard of Visual Communicator® software, but it wasn't until he heard about the product through news reports at the COMDEX tradeshow that he realized what a truly amazing tool it was. Having only a small budget to purchase software, Rush knew that the price of Visual Communicator was right. He showed it to his coworkers, who immediately loved it. "What really caught my eye when I decided to buy Visual Communicator was that for the price you got so many features like virtual sets, lower thirds, and transitions. Usually you would have to buy numerous products to get the functionality you do in Visual Communicator," comments Rush. "And then the ease of use and the DV quality you get, you just can't beat it."
Rush uses Visual Communicator to produce online instructional technology tutorials. The tutorials include visual demonstrations, voice narration, and text instruction to give the user direction on how to complete a particular task. "Visual Communicator is easy-to-use software. I was able to create something decent right away. Our staff members have found these tutorials to be a convenient alternative to live training sessions," comments Rush. For example, a video tutorial can be created on how to use applications like Microsoft Office or advanced e-mail techniques. These lessons are very popular with staff and faculty and can be easily viewed through the university's Instructional Technology website on their own time.
Stretching limited resources
"Visual Communicator gives us the tools to do things we otherwise couldn't do," says Rush. "It enables effective teaching and learning and allows us to meet a larger range of training objectives."
Rush is also creating supplemental instructional course information online for students to access. Recently, Rush created a training demonstration on various techniques students will utilize in their chemistry lab, like safety issues and equipment usage policies. By doing these kinds of video demonstrations, an instructor can save time in class by eliminating the details of working in the lab and go directly into instructional topics.
