Online Rooms: Educator Guide Online Rooms Introduction to Online Rooms Author: Kev Lavery Last Updated: 26/09/2016
In this guide you will learn about: Accessing Online Rooms Setting up a meeting room Checking your audio Layouts, Pods and uses Sharing your screen Recording a session Posting a link to an Online Room in Connect Accessing and using Online Rooms 1. Online Rooms is a web conferencing application powered by Adobe Connect. It can be used to create online meeting rooms or virtual classrooms. These spaces are a great place to collaborate, share ideas and interact with students and colleagues as they give participants the chance to connect regardless of geographic location or device. This introduction will show you how to access and navigate the features of Online Rooms as well as exploring how it integrates with Connect. The accessibility of Online Rooms comes from the fact that it is browser based and doesn t require additional software to run. Sessions in Online Rooms are accessed via a URL so, as long as Attendees have access to the internet, they can attend.
2. You can use this URL to test if your computer can successfully connect to an Online Room: https://onlinerooms.tafeqld.edu.au/common/help/en/support/meeting_test.htm. You can also send this URL to your attendees with your meeting invitation that way all your users will know in advance if they will have any issues (which a majority of them won t). Most computers can connect to and run Online Rooms easily. This site tests that your computer has an up to date version of Flash Player; that you can connect to the Online Rooms server; that your network speed is fast and stable enough to maintain a connection; and lastly checks whether you have the Adobe Connect browser add-in installed - this is an optional add-in for presenting. 3. While a majority of users will attend Online Rooms sessions on a computer, it is also possible to attend sessions on a mobile device or tablet via the Adobe Connect Mobile App (which can be downloaded from Google Play or the App Store).
4. Online Rooms is accessible to all staff through https://onlinerooms.tafeqld.edu.au using your network login information. Like Mediasite and Resourcebank, this is also accessible via the Staff Links in Connect. Students attend Online Rooms sessions as Guests and do not require registered accounts. 5. Let s look at accessing through Connect. We will access Online Rooms, create a room, explore some of the features and then insert it into our Connect unit. I ll select Online Rooms link from the Staff Links - this is available from the home screen as well as from within a unit.
6. This will take me to the Online Rooms login screen (located at https://onlinerooms.tafeqld.edu.au). Like Mediasite and Resourcebank the username and password is the same as my network password. 7. If this is your first time logging in you will need to contact your Regional Administrator so that they can complete the final stage of account activation. Until you do that you will only have access to one room. If you enter this room you will find its primary purpose is to direct you towards contacting your Regional Administrator (although you can also test out your microphone and webcam here too).
8. Once you have had your account fully activated you will have access to the Meetings and Content tabs and buttons. Now we can create a new room. The easiest way to create a new room is the Create New: Meeting button at the top of your Online Rooms Home page. 9. Your room needs a Name, a Summary and a URL. You can select your own custom url suffix (which makes things easier for your attendees) or you can leave it blank to get a randomised URL suffix.
10. I m making a general help room that I plan to use across multiple units so I am going to call it Kev Lavery Help and use the customised URL suffix LaveryHelp. The final URL will be https://onlinerooms.tafeqld.edu.au/laveryhelp 11. The next thing you will notice is the Start Time and Duration options. One of the great things about Online Rooms is that they are persistent, so you only need to set them up once. The room will remain active until you delete it. You can reuse an Online Room as many times as you like without having to make any adjustments. You can set dates and times here but this is only needed if you are going to utilise the Online Rooms interface to email attendees (which isn t a common way of using it). Attendees only need a URL so generally it is just a matter of providing them a URL, a time and date - whether you do that via email, as a Content Topic or News Post in Connect, or even write it on the whiteboard in a classroom.
12. You don t need to make any adjustments to the Audio Conference Settings. You simple need to select Finish to create the room. 13. Once the room has been created you can access it from here (the Online Rooms control panel) or simply by navigating to the URL. It s not just students that can attend Online Rooms - attendees external to TAFE Queensland can join a meeting room as Guests via a meeting URL (provided you accept them).
14. Let s take a look at some of the features of a meeting room and make some adjustments to personalise the space. To do this I ll select to Enter the room we ve just created. 15. Your room will launch in a new tab in your browser (or in the Adobe Connect Add-in if you have installed it already). The first thing you should do when you join a room (as a Participant, Presenter or Host) is check your audio.
16. This can be done really easily in Online Rooms via the Audio Setup Wizard. The Audio Setup Wizard takes you through the setup of all the different aspects of audio setup in an Online Rooms session to ensure that you can both hear and be heard. 17. First it checks your speakers;
18. Then it makes sure you have your preferred microphone selected; 19. Then it gives you an opportunity to record and playback a test piece of audio (which is a great way to know exactly how your attendees are hearing you);
20. Then allows you to test that the area you are broadcasting from is sufficiently quiet. For a more in depth look at audio setup see our Audio Solutions guide. 21. Online Rooms Meeting Rooms are composed of Layouts and Pods. A Pod is an interactive window that allows you to carry out activities in your meeting room. You can have Pods for sharing files, showing attendance, chatting, broadcasting webcams, and more. Layouts are arrangements of Pods that you can customise to suit your meeting. Any customisations will affect your meeting room only.
22. In this meeting room I can see my participants in the Attendees Pod where I can monitor their roles as well as view their statuses and any emoticons they have used. 23. I can communicate with my Attendees in the Chat Pod.
24. I can use a Share Pod to display a PowerPoint Presentation. As well as sharing PowerPoint, JPEG, and PDF documents, I can also share my screen and digital whiteboard. 25. There are other tools I can choose to utilise in my sessions too like the Youtube Share Pod;
26. With this you can search Youtube and create playlists from within a session. 27. The Poll Pod can be used for surveying or testing Attendees.
28. A File Share Pod can be used to provide Attendees with downloadable files. There are more tools too such as the Q&A Pod, the Weblinks Pod, and the Notes and Discussion Notes Pods - each with their own uses and merits. 29. It is also possible to Record your meeting to keep a record of it for any participants who couldn t attend. This recording can be distributed as a URL or converted into an MP4 and downloaded.
30. When you are finished, you can save copies of the chat, discussion, and polling results before you exit your session. 31. With the room customised to suit your needs it s time to circulate the URL to your participants - we re going to post a link in a Connect unit (but you could communicate it to students in a number of ways). The URL of your meeting, in case you need a reminder, can be found under Manage Access & Entry > Invite Participants.
32. We can Copy it from here and then navigate over to Connect. 33. If you are a Facilitator it would be best to post this as a News Item.
34. It can be added the same way as any URL. 35. If you are an Educator you could add it as its own Content Topic within a unit, link to it within a Content Topic, or add it to a News Item.
36. Just ensure that you communicate when you plan to hold the Online Rooms session alongside the URL. It s also important to ensure Open as External Resource is checked so the session opens in a new window. 37. For students, clicking the URL will launch the session where they will sign in as Guests.
38. Remember, Online Rooms are persistent so you can keep using them as often as you like and, if you would prefer different rooms for different uses, you can make as many Online Rooms as you like and customise them all for their individual purpose. To get started with Online Rooms, contact your Regional Contact Officer.