Screencasting 101

 If you're looking for ways to jazz up your website or your online course, consider screencasting, which is the process of recording and narrating what you're doing on the computer. So whether you teach software applications (MS Office, CADD, Accounting, etc), use powerpoint for your teaching or lectures, or use the web or other applications in your course consider screencasting. Really powerful and simple applications of screencasting include:

• recording the answer to a students' question; 
• demonstrating how to research information on the web;
• demonstrating how to perform a specific function in a software application; and
  
• showing students how to login to and naviagate your online course.

The following video is from Techsmith, the makers of Camtasia Studio and Jingproject. Jingproject is free to download and use and allows you to create and share videos of up to 5 minutes in length. If you want to explore screencasting, Jing is a great place to start. As you get comfortable with screencasting and find you want to do more, consider tools such as Camtasia Studio, which you can download and try as a free trial and purchase at a reasonable price with the academic discount. So without further adeiu, here's a quick introduction to screencasting from Techsmith, called Screencating 101.