Voice chat

Voice chat allows for synchronous online communication using your voice and text.

What is voice chat?

Screencapture - Voice chat
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text only version

If you would like to try out the voice chat, there is a short demonstration site at http://webct.netspot.com.au which contains:

  • guides on how to use the voice tools
  • the opportunity for you to experiment with the voice tools in a WebCT® environment
To login to this site as a student:
Username: hw_student01 Password: netspot
Username: hw_student02 Password: netspot
To login to this site as a teacher:
Username: hw_staff Password: netspot

Voice chat is a synchronous online communication tool that allows the teacher and learners to meet, chat and learn using a combination of voice and text online communication options.

Voice chat can be used for a range of online facilitation and communication purposes such as:

  • building community
  • problem solving
  • question and answer sessions
  • brainstorming
  • guest presentations  
  • oral presentations by learners.

You can use voice chat to facilitate fully or partially online courses.

Voice chat is easily accessible technology and does not require a high level of technical skill.

This guide has been created specifically for the Horizon Wimba voice chat tool. However the various sections of the guide should be transferable to other synchronous voice applications.

Horizon Wimba voice chat

  • You need to purchase a licence for Horizon Wimba Voice Tools.
  • Horizon Wimba voice tools can be integrated into any learning management system (LMS).
  • They can also be embedded into a webpage outside a LMS, or linked to webpages.

Who for? Relevance to teaching and learning

Learners

Voice chat can be suitable for communicating with all learner types. Traditional text chats may disadvantage some learners who do not have efficient keyboard skills or who have limited reading/writing literacy skills. Voice chat does not discriminate against any learners as it offers both voice and text.

Teachers

Voice chat can increase the equality of learning for all types of learners. Voice chat also provides greater teaching and learning opportunities (such as increasing access to online guest presenters) for both face-to-face and online learners. Voice chats can help to create a safe and welcoming learning environment for learners.  

Voice chat is also extremely effective for:

  • building online communities
  • facilitating learning activities such as:
    • – brainstorming activities
    • – question and answer sessions
    • – problem solving
    • – individual feedback and support.

To see how voice chats have been used with different learner groups, follow the links below to the case studies. The case studies provide examples of how voice chat was integrated into some courses.

Why use voice chat? Challenges and new approaches for teaching and learning

Communication – the challenges

One significant issue that can challenge teachers working online is that of communicating effectively with all learners so as to achieve the following.

Building a sense of community online

  • How can you build a community and ensure learners and teachers ‘get to know each other’ and feel comfortable working together when many learners may not be comfortable or fluent with written text as a means of communication?

Facilite online courses

  • How can you provide an alternative to written text and ensure that the types of support an online teacher needs to provide are reaching all learners, including those for whom written communication is a barrier?

Engage oral communicators

  • How can you increase the level of engagement of learners and promote deeper level thinking if the only synchronous communication is text?

Why use voice chat? New practices: how voice chat can help meet the challenges

By virtue of the fact that it adds voice to the chat room, voice chat provides new ways of:

Building a sense of community online

Voice chat can be an effective means of creating a sense of community.

  • You can use voice chat for a range of community building activities such as:
    • – introductions and icebreaker activities
    • – getting the learners engaged with the course.
  • Synchronous voice chat allows you and the learners to communicate in a way that is much closer to our natural mode of communication (ie, through speech). Unfortunately text adds another layer of complexity to the communication process that can filter out the more personal aspects of the intended message.
  • It requires skill and practice to develop an online personality when every communication needs to be written. While people can learn to build an online personality through text, this will usually take much longer and can be difficult for learners with poor writing skills.

Facilitating online courses

Many of the learning activities that you facilitate through text chat can be made more engaging in voice. Voice chat can facilitate synchronous:

  • question and answer sessions
  • collaborative problem solving activities
  • brainstorming activities.

Engage learners who prefer oral communication

For learners with low literacy, (or even those who have a preference for communicating orally), text-based communication can be a real barrier to learning. Voice chat:

  • allows for information and learning activities to be communicated orally
  • adds the immediacy of synchronous oral communication.

Voice chat has many advantages for the teacher and learner.

  • The learner can choose between voice or text chat interaction to communicate synchronously with the rest of the group.
  • Voice chat can promote deeper level learning than text chat. Often, learners with slow or poor keyboard skills make simple postings in a text chat environment. These postings tend to be superficial as the learner’s thought process is often distracted while they struggle with the keyboard. During a voice chat session, learners are not distracted by the keyboard and can therefore concentrate on the discussion.

However, there are a few issues that need to be considered when using voice chat.

  • Where you have a group of learners with strong accents within a voice chat, the facilitator may have difficulty ensuring all participants are able to understand each other.
  • Unlike some other voice chat tools, Horizon Wimba voice chat shuffles the order of participant names as they nominate themselves to speak. This can distract the facilitator if they rely on the list during the session.
  • Managing the voice and text areas at the same time with only one facilitator will be challenging. It is best if you can have two facilitators (one to facilitate the voice and one to facilitate the text). However, this may not always be financially practical.

How? Integrating voice chat into teaching and learning

Case study 1: Trades and youth and Case study 2: Disability describe how voice chat (and other voice tools) can be integrated into course communication to provide ways of reaching learners that would otherwise not have been possible.

Listen to the photostories to hear how the teacher has used voice chat communication.

The downloadable learning activities documents describe some of the voice-related learning activities in more detail.

The pedagogy documents describe the underpinning theory of learning that forms the basis of each learning design.

So, how do you go about integrating voice chat into your course? The following section will take you through the steps and offers some advice for first-time users of voice chat.

Planning

Voice chat can be used for multiple purposes such as building community and facilitating courses.

  1. When planning and designing your learning program, consider how voice chat communication could benefit the learners. Some of the things you will need to consider are:
    • the profile of your learners
    • access to resources such as computers and the Internet.
  2. Decide on where your voice chat will be hosted.
  3. Set up the voice chat prior to course commencement.
    Note: Make sure learners test the chat environment prior to a chat session to ensure they can access it. (eg, help learners to check that the appropriate firewall ports are open).
  4. Voice chats can be recorded for learners who are absent from the real time session.

Developing voice chat communication

Voice chat is a great way to capture the learners’ attention while adding significant value to the interaction between learners and the facilitator.

When preparing for voice chat sessions there are a few things to keep in mind.

  • Create a lesson plan in the same way you would when preparing a face-to-face lesson. Online chat sessions must have a clear purpose with a logical sequence. This often needs to be planned.
  • Use chat protocols similar to the way in which you would use protocols in a face-to-face synchronous session. (eg, placing your hand up when you have a question to ask). Participants will quickly become disengaged if there is no clear direction as to the best way to interact with each other.

Preparing learners to the technology

  • Make the voice chat room available to learners prior to any sessions and encourage learners to familiarise themselves with the technology.
  • For learners with minimal computer literacy, a demonstration using a data show or on an individual basis is a good way of introducing the technology prior to undertaking a voice chat session.
  • For learners with higher computer literacy, providing them with a demonstration CD-ROM works well as a way to introduce the technology.

Tips: what to watch out for so you don’t trip up

Planning communication

  • Plan how you will use voice chats carefully so that you use the voice tool to the best purpose. Not all online communication is best facilitated this way. It is good to use the tool for maximum impact.

Technology

  • Learners will need access to computers with sound cards and speakers (or headsets) to participate in voice chat sessions.
  • They will need microphones to participate in voice chat sessions.
  • Pre-teach the various aspects of audio control before beginning a session. Sound quality of recorded messages can vary greatly depending on the:
    • – quality of the microphone
    • – type of microphone (headset, internal personal computer microphone, external desktop microphone)
    • – distance of microphone from speaker’s mouth
    • – record volume level settings.

Working environment

  • If you are working in an environment with loud background noise, this may interfere with the effectiveness of the session.

Technical notes

  • Voice chat can be integrated into learning management systems (LMS) such as WebCT®, and Blackboard®.
  • It can be embedded into a webpage outside of a LMS or linked to webpages.
  • Any software required needs to be downloaded and installed (eg, JavaTM, media players)
  • Ports will need to be enabled.
  • You will need to purchase a licence for Horizon Wimba Voice Tools. For Victorian registered training organisations RTOs the Horizon Wimba Voice Tools are available in the TAFE Virtual Campus (TAFE VC).
  • The voice chat is easily integrated into a TAFE VC course.

Download a guide to using Horizon Wimba Voice Direct (voice chat)

Here is an example of what an RTO has done to support teachers setting up voice boards using the Horizon Wimba Voice Tools. Documents developed by GippsTAFE. Used with permission.