In the Current or Swimming Upstream?

Abstract

In the not too distant future, university students will have trouble recalling a pre-You Tube or pre-podcast world. While streaming media in those formats has become ubiquitous in many areas of their lives through ease of use and dissemination, how does it factor into their learning? Should instructors in higher education utilize students’ engagement with streaming media as teachable opportunities? Or, in lieu of instructors intentionally choosing to use streaming media, what about the potential for it to be imposed on them for logistical or operational reasons and the effects of that on student learning and teaching? Building upon prior work that has been done on the use of streaming media in higher education (Chang, 2007; Phillips et al., 2007; Shepherd, 2003; Foertsch et al., 2002; Brahler et al., 1999), this chapter will examine it from several instructors’ perspectives with a focus on their decision-making processes, implementations, challenges, and opportunities. From their experiences, a set of grounded guidelines for using streaming media in higher education will be developed and offered as starting points for others interested in trying this in their teaching.