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HyFlex Teaching and the Live Streaming of Lectures

Michael Parkes, E-Learning Technologist

Queen Mary University of London

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What is HyFlex teaching?

HyFlex teaching = a ‘hybrid’ and ‘flexible’ approach to teaching and course design.
Gives students the option of attending sessions on campus, or participating remotely online, or doing both.
Students can change their mode of attendance weekly or by topic, according to need or preference.

Background and context

In September and October 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a restriction on the number of students able to attend on campus.
Teaching switched to online platforms. In our case mainly Blackboard Collaborate for lectures with some use of Zoom for tutorials.
However, what to do about students (particularly international ones) who had travelled to the UK and were living on campus.

Background and context

To offer something in addition to just the remote learning experience to ‘enrich the experience’ for our students that were physically present on campus (many of whom had come from abroad and were resident in student accommodation either on campus or close by).
At the same time, we didn’t want any of our other ‘homebound’ students to miss out and not have the opportunity to participate and benefit from the sessions.
‘Enrichment sessions’ – series of case study presentations for students across our ‘Mental Health’ MSc programmes (approx. 200 students). Attendance optional

Methodology

Technology used: Echo 360 integrated (via LTI external tool) within Moodle
We’d been using this system for several years previously for the recording of lectures but had never used the ‘live stream’ functionality.
Only certain lecture theatres equipped with Echo had the additional live stream option. A live stream session has to be scheduled in advance and can’t be enabled retrospectively once recording is underway.
Students could access live stream and or the recording by logging on to their Moodle course and clicking the Echo link.

Practical considerations

Presenter would be assisted by another member of staff with laptop whose responsibility was to monitor the online Q&A and relay the questions to the presenter in the room.
Whereas the lecture theatre used had a 225 seat capacity, this was reduced to 52 to ensure adequate social distancing.
Because of room capacity limit, students wishing to attend the lecture on campus had to register via a poll created using the ‘group choice’ activity in Moodle.

Outcome

25-30 students in attendance in the lecture theatre, with many more attending the live stream remotely.
Sessions were viewed upwards of 150 times.
With Echo’s recording analytics you can see who has watched the recordings synchronously in comparison to asynchronously (under ‘user views’).
The students attending virtually, could change the dimensions of the media being displayed in browser, so that they could choose which element they wanted to be the primary content to look at.
Questions/comments were added via the Q&A feature. Students often answered each others’ questions.
Lovely to see excitement of lecturer at being able to teach in a lecture theatre again and see their students in person!

Conclusion & recommendations

Practice in advance to check AV equipment in the room as well as familiarise yourself with the interface for those attending remotely.
Bring a laptop or tablet to monitor online Q&A via the VLE/Echo. The built-in monitor on the lecture console in the room will more than likely be completely filled with your PPT slides when in presentation mode.
If possible have a colleague on hand to help monitor and relay the online questions.
Ensure lecturer repeats any questions aloud for benefit of audience (either in the room or online).
Use a portable microphone for best results.

Some more tips

Avoid giving students a URL to attend session if accessing Echo via a Moodle integration. Authentication works seamlessly that way.
A built-in polling feature is available too (though not used on the day).
External users. If they don’t have accounts they can’t participate in Q&A to post questions.
Acknowledgements. Getting it right requires a team effort – many people in various depts involved at all stages from booking appropriate rooms, ensuring the AV tech works, those presenting, those assisting with questions and, last but not least, the students!