Reaction Paper on Digital Session

(ECE123)
Sheryll Diane T. Abot
School of Electrical, Electronics, and Computer Engineering
Mapa Institute of Technology
Intramuros, Manila Philippines
Email: sdtabot@gmail.com

The digital session is not successful because majority

of us in the class were unable to join due to connection
difficulties. Moreover, some of us who already joined
had been disconnected from time to time. It appears
that Blackboard has a congestion problem and cannot
work properly with all of the students accesing it at the
same time. There has been some problems with the
audio which couldnt be clearly identified whether it is
the systems fault or the users device. Someone
complained that the audio cannot be heard while others
claimed to hear them in an unpleasantly loud volume. It
is said to be loud because someone is requesting the
speaker to distance herself from the microphone.
The Blackboard Collaboration has some nice
features like the pointer, pencil, clear button, the ability
to share files and applications, use whiteboard, record
the session, and more. The pointer and pencil are very
useful to point and emphasize something. The clear
button is good but it is preferrable to have also an eraser
that may erase only a portion and not everything. It is
nice that we are able to share powerpoint files; however,
a powerpoint file with numerous number of slides, about
100 or more, cannot be uploaded based on my
experience. Moreover, when they are converted to be
compatible with the Blackboard Collaboration, the
animations and transitions are removed. Thus, such

features of Microsoft Powerpoint cannot be used to

emphasize something important. Rather, the pointer
and pencil can be used. It is good that writing or
drawing using the pencil feature on the shared files
doesnt overwrite them. Using the whiteboard is a great
experience, everyone can write or draw on it at the same
time. Another thing, the idea to be able to record a
session is great; but when I checked the history of the
recorded sessions, none of them appears to be useful in
any way. This is because the Blackboard Collaboration
failed to save the recorded session; the video files only
amount to few seconds and none of what has been
presented has been captured. It is implied that recording
the session will automatically save the session since
there is no save button or feature. So, the users cannot
be held responsible for that.
The raise hand feature is another good thing. It
provides the opportunity for everyone to participate.
However, in this session, none of them used this feature.
Muting the audio and activating the microphone only
when needed to speak is a good way to avoid
overlapping of voices. However, others prefer to simply
type. Speaking of that, chat feature is very useful for
those whose microphones are not working properly.