Web Conferencing

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Instructors have access to a variety of tools, supported by the University for meeting with students, either in lecture format, smaller groups or even individually. All these tools are easy to use, intuitive, and free for U of G faculty, staff and students.

 

Options for Capturing Lectures
Features MS Teams MS Teams Live Zoom Pro Zoom Webinars WebEx Events Virtual Classroom
Max Live Participants 1,000  10,000  300+* 500/1,000* 1,000 150 
Capture/Record Lectures yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Share a Presentation yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Annotate Presentation yes. no. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Share/Stream Video Content yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Whiteboard yes. no. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Public Chat yes. no. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Breakout Rooms  50 no. 100 no. 0 6
Invite External Participants yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. yes.
Q&A  no. yes. yes. yes. yes. no.
Live Polling  yes. no. yes. yes. yes. no.
Web Conferencing Classroom Compatible  yes. yes. yes. yes. yes. no.
CourseLink Integration no. no. yes. no. no. yes.
Supported by CCS  CCS  OpenEd OpenEd CCS OpenEd 

Table Key: yes. = yes,  no. = no

*For an additional cost, add-ons are available for 500 and 1000 participants.

MS Teams

Office 365 Teams is a collaboration service that provides shared conversation spaces to help teams coordinate and communicate information. Teams delivers chat-based collaboration, calling, meetings, and live events, so you can expand the audience of your meetings. 

Microsoft 365 live events bring live video streaming to a new level, encouraging connection throughout the entire engagement lifecycle with attendees before, during, and after live events. You can create a live event wherever your audience, team, or community resides, using Microsoft Stream, Teams or Yammer. Teams live events is an extension of Teams meetings, enabling users to broadcast video and meeting content to a large online audience. These are meant for one-to-many communications where the host of the event is leading the interactions and audience participation is primarily to view the content shared by host.

Resources
Zoom 

Zoom is a web-conferencing tool available to instructors for meeting virtually with larger courses, of up to 300 students, and is supported by OpenEd. Students will be able to access meetings and recordings through their CourseLink sites.

OpenEd Resources

External Resources
WebEx 

The Cisco WebEx web-conferencing tool is available for larger courses, of up to 1000 students, and is centrally supported by the University. Students don't have to log in to view the live stream.

Resources
Virtual Classroom

CourseLink's Virtual Classroom tool is an integrated web-conferencing tool that allows for lectures to be live-streamed for up to 150 students. For the purpose of academic continuity, hosted live online synchronous lectures take place during the regularly scheduled face-to-face time and students watch it simultaneously. While the lecture is streaming, students can use the chat function to engage in a discussion. Lectures can also be recorded from within this tool and later viewed in CourseLink for those students who could not watch them simultaneously.

Resources

Recording Your Lectures

As instructors continue to support students with our return to in-person teaching and learning, Zoom or Teams recordings help to support academic continuity for students who might otherwise miss a class due to illness or self-isolation requirements.   

Zoom and Teams have been popular with instructors to support remote and hybrid teaching during the pandemic, and instructors continue to use these tools to deliver courses and create resources for students. 

Both platforms make the recording process simple, and the recording can be shared with students in a variety of ways. If you have used Zoom or Teams to deliver a course remotely, then the process will already be very familiar to you. 

Create a Simple Lecture Recording Step-By-Step

The basic process for creating a simple lecture recording is as follows: 

  1. Select a Web Conferencing platform (e.g., Zoom or Teams). 
  2. Create a meeting in that platform and join as the host. 
  3. Share a screen or window in that meeting (e.g., what is being projected to the class). 
  4. Begin the recording, conduct your lecture, and end the recording when your class is finished. 
  5. Share the recording (e.g., via CourseLink’s Content tool). 

Recording Synchronous Lectures

When recording a live lecture for the purpose of providing it as a resource to students, there is usually no need for students to join the meeting. Instead, only the instructor joins the meeting, making it a “meeting of 1” where they can record their voice, slides, and screen shares while performing their lecture in the classroom. While this works well, there are some limitations to keep in mind: 

  • Audio will be recorded from your computer microphone, which will not have much range. As such, try to stay near the computer while speaking and avoid walking-and-talking. 
  • Video of yourself is optional but can be recorded using your computer’s webcam, requiring you to stay in frame during the lecture.
  • Any breaks or pauses during the class will be included in the recording unless it is paused.
  • If you take questions during the class, the audio will not be picked up by your computer’s microphone very well. It is recommended that you try to repeat the question back for the recording.
Resources for Using Zoom and Teams

Information and resources specific to recording on both platforms is available below. If you need support determining which web conferencing technology to use or other technological considerations, please complete our Consultation Request Form to set up a meeting with one of our instructional technology specialists.

Zoom

Teams

Options for Recording Asynchronous Lectures   

If you are recording a lecture specifically for asynchronous delivery (not delivered live students), then either Zoom or Teams can still be used; however, there is an additional option available in PowerPoint that you may wish to consider.

Voice over PowerPoint Resources
File Sharing Options and Posting to CourseLink

Once your recording is complete, you will need to share it with your students. There are various options available such as directly linking to a Zoom cloud recording, posting to OneDrive, uploading to Stream, etc.

Once the file has been stored in the desired location and shared, you may then post a link to that recording to CourseLink.

Resources
Privacy 

Live Remote Invigilation with Zoom or Teams

Web conferencing technologies such as Zoom or Teams can be leveraged for live remote invigilation of exams or quizzes; however, they should not be considered 100% effective in preventing academic misconduct and should be approached with caution.

For more information, please consult our Tips for Live Remote Invigilation with Zoom or Teams page.