Adventures in Video Conferencing

When I first started this semester, my boss told me I’d be teaching some video conferencing classes. What this meant was unclear at that point, even to her. It had something to do with the fancy new room being built on the fourth floor, some other schools, and me teaching debate (a subject I know nothing about) in front of a camera.

Well, video conferencing didn’t start until May, at which point the room was finished, schools had signed up to participate (high schools and middle schools), and the purpose and structure was still murky, at best. Turned out though that I was not alone in this endeavor: my deskmate William had been wrangled into taking part for reasons that were also murky. Something about him wanting to see how the technology worked, mixed with him not wanting to take over my Korean teacher classes when I started video conferencing, mixed with me being afraid to do it on my own. Something like that.

Here are the facts, as we knew them. Eight schools had signed up: three high schools, and five middle schools. And when I say “signed up”, do not be misled into thinking they did so by choice or by want. The conversation between the Daegu Metropolitan Office of Education and the school probably went something like this:

“Hello School, would you like to participate in video conferencing classes?”
“No, thank you.”
“Would you like a fancy new room with televisions and cool pictures of the natural wonders of the world all over the walls?”
“Yes, please!”
“So then I ask you again, would you like to participate in video conferencing classes?”
“Yes, thank you.”

Back to the facts: we were not to treat this class like a lecture class. In other words, we would not be standing in front of the screen talking at the students. The class was to be an interactive class, but not a conversation class. It was to be more like a debate class.

Things we didn’t know: how long the classes would be, how many times total we’d see the students, how many students would be in each class, what the English level was of said students, when we would start the classes, and what the structure of the class would be.

Anyway, along rolled May and somehow William and I started co-teaching the classes. And as it turns out, they are 30-minute debate classes.

The way it works is like this: William and I stand in front of a blue screen (careful not to wear blue on that particular day, lest we want to be mere floating heads on the screen), with a computer in front of us. Before us are two television screens, and slightly above that is the video camera. On the left-hand television screen we can see the classroom full of students. On the right-hand, we see ourselves superimposed over our PowerPoint presentation. When we first started doing these classes in May, the students could see us from a bit below the shoulders on up; now, for some mysterious reason, they can only see our heads, which means if we want to clap or do any sort of hand gestures, we must do them high so that the camera catches them. We look like monkeys clapping directly in front of our faces.

William and I switch off doing the PowerPoint slides. We are getting better at moving on and off camera. With the perspective all screwy, it’s hard to know which direction you’re moving (same goes for making any kind of hand gestures). For the first couple of weeks, I inexplicably hopped off screen. Like a bunny. I’m not sure why I thought this was good teaching. Maybe I was channeling Lambchop or some other beloved children’s puppet character. Anyway, I’ve lately learned to just step off screen like a normal person.

The set-up is challenging, and volume is definitely a problem. We shout/bark at the microphone, because we’re afraid the students won’t be able to hear us otherwise. We definitely can’t hear them that well. Wherever their microphones are placed doesn’t seem to be the right place, and if any of the students are whispering or moving papers or moving in their chairs, it drowns out whichever kid is actually trying to be heard. Often if we can’t hear the student talking, and we’ve asked them to repeat themselves, and we still can’t hear them, William and I just clap (on screen if we remember to raise our hands high enough) and bark an enthusiastic “good job!”

Knowing where to look is also a challenge. If we look into the camera, we can’t see the students or the PowerPoint. If we look at the students or the PowerPoint, the students presumably see us staring off into space, slightly wall-eyed and unfocused. I don’t know about William, but my eyes are on a constant rotation, like some kind of nut job. And we already look like nut jobs because, for some reason, we think because we’re on screen, that we have to smile constantly. Our faces are carnival clown rictuses that ache afterward.

So, every class is a balancing act, but yesterday’s class was a real doozy. First, the IT guy wasn’t there to set everything up. He showed us how to do it the week earlier, but something wasn’t working. We couldn’t get our faces superimposed over our PowerPoint. After much fiddling and minor freaking out, we learned that the students could see us on one screen, and our PowerPoint on the other, but that we couldn’t see ourselves. This might seem like a blessing, except there was no way of knowing how much of our bodies they could see. Was it from the shoulders up again, or were our faces being chopped in half at the upper lip? From the not infrequent smirking and snickering from the students, I vote for the latter. This particular middle school has 16 students in the class. About 12 of them are ok. The other 4 are little jerks—they clickety-clack away on their cell phones, chat, huddle into their chairs, wrapped in seasonally unnecessary blankets, or tip their heads far enough forward so that they’ve made a hair home they can escape to. The teacher on the other end does little to discipline them, and of course since we are cyber teachers, we also can do very little. After all, who cares about a menacing look from a TV teacher who might as well be a cartoon character for all the power they have?

So, we’re going about our lesson as best we can. It’s William’s turn on camera, and as he’s just about to finish up, I can hear his voice getting a little clogged. Now, William has been sick for the last week or so, and has been doing a lot of violent coughing. And the way his voice sounds is the way you sound when you’re desperately trying to hold in a cough. But thankfully, he finishes in time. Just as I step on screen to do my part, William drops to the floor. I see him in my periphery, huddled and crouched into a ball, trying not to cough. I start talking. As I talk, I see/sense William crawl out of the area near the computer and toward the door leading out of the conference room. And all the while he’s nearly choking. He makes it out finally, stands up, and starts coughing in the hall. I do my best not to die laughing. The absurdity of the situation is beyond me.

William returns, coughed out and looking better. We go on with the lesson. But for some reason, the volume in this school’s classroom is particularly bad this week. Nearly everything the students say, we have to ask each other confirmation on, or ask them to repeat. Meanwhile, of course, the 4 jerk-faces, are texting, talking, blanketing, and burrowing deeper into their hair homes. Then comes the turn of the group defending why wifi should not be provided in all schools. I go on clapping and shouting “good job” at them, until one particular boy starts to speak. His voice is weird. I don’t know how or why, but it’s just weird. Martian-like. I’m still coming down after William’s unexpected and unusual exit from the room, so this is striking me as particularly funny. I try so hard to listen, and all I hear is this: “Blah blah blah wah wah wah . . . crackers . . . blah blah blah . . . crackers . . . blah crackers blah.” My forehead crinkles. I look at William. His face is crunched in confusion as well. We pause, shift nervously on our feet, and then . . .

Of course: Clap clap clap. “Good job! Great!”

And this is how video conferencing classes go. At least how ours have gone. Each class, it’s something different, something weird. Sometimes the teacher rearranges the classroom mid-lecture because he feels like it. Sometimes the school cancels last minute. Sometimes the equipment doesn’t work. Sometimes the students are staring off into space. Sometimes we accidentally wear blue and part of our bodies go missing.

This week might be our last teaching the class, and we still haven’t seen half the schools. But they still got their fancy new rooms, and I guess, in the end we get to put something else on our resumes. And lest I sound too dismissive, we also get the experience of trying out this kind of teaching, even if we do hop off the screen like a bunny or collapse in a coughing mess on the floor.