Lectern: a digital desk system for video-free course-lecture capturing and playback

Despite extensive research and development efforts, existing asynchronous/distance learning systems remain prohibitively expensive, mainly because of the use of digital/analog video to record and play back course lectures. As a result, full-scale deployment of digital learning technology has been limited to only a very small number of institutions. The Lectern project aims to eliminate the expensive equipment and operation cost associated with video-based course lecture recording while delivering the same level of instruction effectiveness. Lectern employs the digital pen and touch-sensitive monitor technologies to build a digital desk, which is shown to be able to effectively support conventional lecturing activities and to transparently capture instructors' classroom presentations with minimal intrusion. In addition, the recorded lectures are automatically indexed, converted to a Web-ready format, and made available to end users through the Internet, without any human intervention. This paper describes the design, implementation, and evaluation of the first Lectern prototype, as well as results of a usability test study.