A spilt screen application - NotePad++

As an English teacher, it is often a requirement to show two documents together on the same screen.  When conducting a reading exercise you might want to have the reading text on the left and the questions on the right. An ideal application for this is NotePad++. This is free software, downloadable from many sites. It is easy to use, but you will need to spend five or ten minutes exploring the features initially

For presentations, you need to have it operating in text mode.  This is how you can use it with a split-screen, with both sides scrolling independently. 

   

What web cam should we use?

All systems now come with a camera and built-in microphone, but maybe the one that comes with a particular system is not good enough - especially the in-built microphone - for online teaching. One can use a headset, but I don't like to. 

My system does not have a good microphone and the camera gives a bit of a grainy image, so I use a USB webcam -  a Sony BRU-200. Like me, it is a bit old, and works well, like me, but unlike me, is not available anymore. Some reviewers have said that it was too expensive for the specification - but then how much do you pay for quality?

I could be wrong, but I don't think that Sony sells webcams anymore.  I would be interested to know from readers what web-cam they use.

Computer hardware and software issues

I use an early generation I3 HP laptop with 4Mb memory for online teaching. It is an excellent system and very productive, despite being seven years old. I do not plan to replace it until the issue of Windows 11 compliant systems is finalised. I do not intend to switch to Windows 11 yet, but, of course, do not want to be caught out with an operating system not supported, whenever that happens (2023?).

Incidentally, my backup PC is even older. It is a 2009 Acer laptop using an Intel Centrino. It works.  The disk access is slow, so I have all the files I use with students on an SD card. When I use it the online students have not noticed any difference except for the occasional sound blip.

For the online teacher - Google Meet or Zoom? Surprisingly, Google Meet seems to use twice the amount of systems resources as Zoom on my system. Meet occupies 540Mb of internal memory, whereas Zoom occupies 256Mb. CPU utilisation, with any users, is 33% on Meet and 14% on Zoom. The problem for Meet users that this presents is that the CPU fan is in continuous operating mode during Meet classes. Accordingly, in Meet the system is less responsive and adds a few decibels of noise. 

  

Background music during an online session - online muzak

There are periods in my lessons when I want students to do some work on their own for a short time. For example, read a couple of pages from a book, and then, perhaps after five minutes, discuss what has been read. I have found that it is a good idea to put on some background music during this period. Being online with nothing happening seems like a non-online-teaching thing. When the music stops it is time to start the discussion.

The choice of music is problematic. There is an issue of copyright and paying the rights owner, I think, although I am not sure. If there is a legal issue then it is dependant on the country the teacher is based in. The "fair use" of someone else's music might be in play here.

Back to the choice of music issue. Obviously, it should not be something students will actually listen to - so, online teaching muzak is a good term to identify it.  My first criteria is that there must not be any vocals - obviously. That would be too distracting. A good strategy is to look at the free midi files, which do not have a vocal track, and which also overcome any copyright issue. I like to have these midi versions ready to play;

"Pictures at an Exhibition - all of the pictures " by Mussorgsky.
"Rock With You" - Michael Jackson
"Enigma Variations" Elgar
"Scarborough Fair" - anonymous
"Piano Concerto in A Minor" - Grieg

The best ever is "Rock with You"  Rock with you

Make sure your music player is looping back to the beginning.

Good not-listening!

Pre-loading an image onto Zoom whiteboard

It is not possible, which is a shame. It is something I would like to do. It does not involve a lot of programming by the Zoom people. I am waiting. In the meantime, I share MS Paint instead with the class. Not quite the same thing - I know.

False information about online teaching

In the world of online teaching, a lot of things are discussed on the Internet. Good or bad practice, buy this computer, use this addon, Zoom will save/destroy the world of education, etc. 

Some of the content is purely marketing and easily identifiable, at least by teachers. Maybe it has some value. 

A second type is disguised marketing content.  Or more precisely, articles written by people who are paid by a product or service provider. They are normally about 400 words long, with some pictures. The article seems to be objective and complete. Perhaps we all have to be slightly cynical when we open up a web page.  Unfortunately, this is something we have to live with.

The third type we need to be wary of is the article written by a supposed "expert" - who is not. They are often academics and only have experience in a limited and unrealistic higher education environment. They have to write on the subject, it is part of their job description - they are Professor Brightfellow of Elitebridge University.