Using Wimba Voice Tools:
"A lot of staff will use voice boards with public threads so students can send each other posts. If there is assessment involved, we could use private threads in voice boards. Also, some students can be shy; they might feel more at ease if other students aren't listening in.
Another good thing about the voce board is that it fits into the busy schedule of the typical extra-mural student. They are so busy with work or home and their study that attending a 3 hour lecture can seem out of the question - they need to find a way to squeeze in time - with voice boards you can get around to it when you have time. There's also the opportunity to download posts from voice boards to listen to them from their iPod's for example.
We think that Voice Direct is going to become a vehicle for an oral examinations. We won't have to use the telephone or send lecturers all over the country to meet with students to assess them. All students need is the internet and a reasonable quality of head set and sound card in the PC. We are concerned about sound quality; we've found if you have a reasonable dial-up internet connection and a sound card that the sound quality will usually be good, but we will be experimenting with this over the coming semester."
