It can be challenging to teach live online class sessions (i.e., synchronous sessions), when all you have in front of you is a round glass dot for your webcam. Are your students paying attention? Do they understand the concepts you’re discussing? Did they think your joke was funny?
Beyond providing you with feedback on how class is going, there are clearly benefits to having students use cameras in online synchronous sessions, like building a sense of community and connectedness.
But, should they be required to be visible on camera?
In general, leaders in culturally-responsive teaching and online learning recommend that students should be in control of the decision to be on camera, unless the need for them to be visible is connected to specific learning outcomes (e.g., modeling an action or behavior, public speaking, etc.).
Considerations about webcams in synchronous sessions
Privacy
When students have webcams on, they may be exposing more of their home/location than they are comfortable sharing with faculty or classmates (particularly if they share a living space with children or roommates). They may be embarrassed by the state or quality of their home, which is also an issue of equity, and are concerned with how their location impacts others’ perception of them. This can exacerbate imposter syndrome. Students may also be concerned with the security of the session, the storage or dissemination of the recordings, and how their video or image could be shared or used in negative ways (e.g., cyber bullying, being ridiculed on social media, etc.). Students who are parents may be more sensitive to the privacy of their children on camera, as well.
Bandwidth/Technology
Some students may have computers without webcams, particularly if they purchased low-end models to save money. Bandwidth is always a concern both for running your own webcam as well as receiving the webcam video from your classmates (even worse using tools that allow 49 simultaneous webcams). Many of our students continue to rely on smartphones for Internet connection or as a primary device, and may have data plans with limited cellular data.
Equity
Concerns related to privacy or bandwidth and technology disproportionately impact students of color, women, and students with lower incomes. In addition, there are gender differences in what it takes to be “camera ready” in your appearance which places unequal stress on women.
Distraction and fatigue
When you turn on your own camera, you see yourself in a preview (location/size of the preview varies by tool). Research on the effects of this have shown it is both a distraction and a source of stress for many individuals. We tend to worry about how we look and are being perceived at higher rates because we have a way to monitor that. This is mentally tiring and distracting, which affects the ability to learn.
Engaging students and getting feedback in synchronous sessions
Text chat
Encourage the use of the text chat during meetings. Students quickly take to the text chat for posting questions about something that confuses them or responses to your questions, and many faculty find that students participate more actively in online sessions than they do in face-to-face sessions. I often encourage students to post a greeting or share an emoji for how they feel at the start of a session, and that breaks the ice on using the text chat.
- Include questions or exercises to check their understanding, just as you would in a face-to-face course. You can use a polling feature to ask students to provide a response to the question, or have them post it to the text chat. If I’m using PowerPoint or another visual tool, I usually include the question in my materials as a prompt, but I can also introduce questions on-the-fly for students.
- Use non-verbal cues, like emojis in text chat or participant reaction icons (in Collaborate or Zoom) to indicate understanding, confusion, readiness to move on, etc.
Ask students to post a profile picture in Blackboard or O365 so that the photo replaces the blank silhouette in Blackboard Collaborate or Teams (students can also add a photo directly in Blackboard Collaborate). Because this is more controlled than having their webcam on, students may be more comfortable adding a photo that would represent them (I would still not require it be a photo of them, but at least of something that represents them)
