{"id":7983,"date":"2016-11-16T14:17:22","date_gmt":"2016-11-16T19:17:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/carleton.ca\/edc\/2016\/blog-using-bigbluebutton-engage-students-easier-powerful-ever\/"},"modified":"2026-05-06T13:28:01","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T17:28:01","slug":"blog-using-bigbluebutton-to-engage-your-students-is-easier-and-more-powerful-than-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/tls\/2016\/blog-using-bigbluebutton-to-engage-your-students-is-easier-and-more-powerful-than-ever\/","title":{"rendered":"Blog: Using BigBlueButton to engage your students is easier and more powerful than ever"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n Blog: Using BigBlueButton to engage your students is easier and more powerful than ever\n <\/h1>\n \n \n <\/header>\n\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n

By Elspeth McCulloch, EDC Educational Technology Development Coordinator<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Have you thought about incorporating BigBlueButton (BBB) into your course? BigBlueButton is a synchronous web conferencing tool that allows instructors and TAs to host live online presentations, seminars, office hours and meetings from cuLearn. The technology is feature rich, easy to use and fully supported at Carleton. You can learn to set up a session, load a presentation, answer questions and record the session in just a few minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BigBlueButton recently added breakout rooms so instructors can bring students in to a large group session and then assign smaller groups for more focused discussion on specific questions or topics. Classroom assessment techniques like think-pair-share, jigsaw, case study analysis and peer review that have previously been out of reach in traditional online courses are now an option. Once the breakout sessions have finished and the whole class has reconvened, instructors can use polling or emoticons to get quick feedback. If students have selected a reporter in their groups, BigBlueButton makes it easy to turn over a microphone or webcam to anyone in the session.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Robert Shepherd, an associate professor of Public Policy and Program Evaluation at Carleton, says that BigBlueButton has really transformed his teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI find the use of BigBlueButton to be of critical importance to the effective functioning of my online courses. It provides a vehicle to engage students in real-time discussion, while also serving as my virtual office. The navigation is fairly straightforward, but for the most part, I find the tool and excellent way to engage with students in real time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re considering incorporating BBB into your course, here are some tips and best practices to get you started:<\/p>\n\n\n\n