Using Videoconferencing to facilitate various perspectives on teaching and learning process

Our session at the 'DIVERSE Conference' in the University of Derby, July 2001, was entitled, 'Integrating Videoconferencing into Educational Practice'. During the session, Margaret Farren of Dublin City University (DCU) used videconferencing and NetMeeting to link with and Ed Tweedy of Rockingham Community College in the USA. Margaret discussed how she was attempting to integrate videoconferencing into teaching and learning at DCU, and Ed discussed projects he was involved in at Rockingham Community College (RCC).Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in general can enable teaching and learning to take place in a flexible environment, allowing dialogue and interactivity among participants based in different geographical locations and in different cultures. This collaboration can enhance the teaching and learning process and allow for various perspectives on issues. It opens up the teaching and learning process to different points of view and can create synergy between an online community, which can lead to deeper intercultural understanding.Videoconferencing is one application of ICT that involves using appropriate hardware and software to enable two or more people, in different locations, to see and hear each other at the same time, sometimes even sharing computer applications for collaboration. In this paper, we intend to document how we have used desktop videoconferening in order to improve the learning of both the teacher and the learner for the period 1999-2002. We will explore three sample collaborative projects, which are intended to show flexible features of desktop videoconferencing in the context of internet collaboration.