Blog : Webinar and Meeting Tools

Tool: Adobe Connect

Website: www.adobe.com/es/products/adobeconnect.html

Rating: 

It is a web conferencing software service that offers immersive online meeting experiences for small group collaboration, virtual classrooms and large scale webinars, to create information and general presentations, online training materials, web conferencing, learning modules, and user desktop sharing.  Adobe connect is a flash technology based which is defined as a well-finished product. Its GUI is quite intuitive and well organised to allow all user to learn how it work easily and fast.

Usage

Users of this tool can benefit from an array of features such as unlimited and customizable meeting rooms, Multiple meeting rooms per user, Breakout sessions within a meeting, VoIP, Audio and video conferencing, Meeting recording, Screen sharing, Notes, chat, and whiteboards, User management, administration, and reporting, Polling, Central content library and Collaboration Builder SDK. Adobe connect is priced at $1250/year on Adobe Connect Webinars version. $3500/year on Adobe Connect Learning version. Adobe Connect Meetings version $500/year. One-month free trial available.

Review

As it has many features the output of this tool can vary a lot, for example we could do screen and document sharing, polls, Q6A, chat, notes, whiteboard, rich media sharing
This tool can be accessed through web, so internet connection is required to use it. It is ready for multiple devices such as desktop, tablets or mobile. However, as it requires internet connection it could be potentially unavailable in some cases or even could have bad performance if the Internet bandwidth is not enough.

Tool Evaluation

Tool: Skype

Website: www.skype.com

Rating: 

Skype is a free software program that allows you to make free voice and video calls to any other computer in the world via a high-speed internet connection. Tools like Skype allow students in even the most rural areas to connect with other students, educators, or interesting people from around the world, creating myriad educational opportunities.

Usage

Collaborating with other classes is probably the most popular way to use Skype in the classroom. Possible scenarios include: Reading to another class- Connecting with reading buddies. When students have worked all semester long on a project and you would love to have them make a formal presentation to another group of students. Students can virtually present projects to another class and have the other class critique their work. To take this one step further, educators could pair students from each class to work on the project virtually and then work together to present the projects via Skype. Polishing language skills- Foreign-language teachers have embraced Skype as a powerful tool to reinforce second-language acquisition. By partnering with a class in another country, both classes can refine their conversational skills. It also serves as a way for students to gain first-hand knowledge of another culture. Be aware, however, that time-zone differences can sometimes make these collaborations prohibitive..

Review

Skype is a very useful tools as there is a number of useful outputs that can prove successful in the classroom. Skype can be used for message, voice and video call, all from one app. It can also be used for free group video calls. It can be used as a file sharing tool and can be used to send pictures and files, or share your screen. Skype Translator will translate your conversation into another language in near real-time allowing you to speak with anyone around the world.

Tool Evaluation

Tool: Go To Webinar

Website: www.gotowebinar.com

Rating: 

GoToMeeting is a widely used flexible tool for teleconferencing and online meetings or holding webinars. It can be used from any browser as well as most mobile devices, with or without a camera. There are quite extensive features in the free version, while the professional versions offer even more powerful tools. GoToWebinar, a subsidiary of GTM. It is especially convenient for education as it allows educators to set up online seminars and invite students, lecturers and panellists to join. It is a really useful way to incorporate online tools to communicate with students in remote areas. It is an easy way to deliver online seminars. There are a number of different price packages available for GoToWebinar, it ranges from a free thirty day trial, to a starter package that is 82Euros per month up to 100 attendees, the pro version which is 182Euros per month up to 500 attendees and the Plus version which is 273Euros per month up to 1000 attendees

Usage

Using Go To Webinar is a popular platform for educators as it allows for such as hosting webinars in English, German, Spanish, French, Italian and Chinese. This webinar service integrates with Outlook, or you can have the application distribute invitations. If you use GoToWebinar’s application, you can invite people as presenters, and they have presenter roles as soon as they log in. This webinar service has integration for Facebook and Twitter so you can also promote your conference through these social media outlets. Finally, you can also add participants during the seminar by sharing the meeting’s unique URL. This service has apps so that people can attend using a smartphone or tablet.

Review

“With 100% of ‘Fortune100’, and 98% of ‘Fortune500’ companies as its clients, GoToWebinar can be recommended without hesitation to any company seriously committed to maximizing reach of their target audiences, in the most cost-effective, secure and reliable manner. With unmatched and multiple user-friendly, features, GoToWebinar stands head and shoulders above the rest.”- The Review Jury Online

Tool Evaluation