As the V2 Adobe Connect Pro subject matter expert on our team, I’ve produced a myriad of trainings and events with my clients on the Adobe Connect Pro platform. Adobe Connect is one of my favorite platforms as an event manager because of its flexibility and collaboration features which lend itself well to a virtual classroom. Let’s take a peek at some of these features and how you can utilize them in your trainings.
Adobe Layouts – What are they? Layouts are a feature that allows you to create different elements or pods within the adobe connect meeting room. These pods include chat, polls, video (webcam), links, Q&A (moderated questions & answers), and share pods that allow you to share presentation files as well as your computer screen. Adobe Layouts let you as the Host choose where these pods live, and how they appear. For example, at one point in your presentation, you may wish to poll the audience on whether or not they have completed pre-work required of them prior to the training session. You can easily switch to this layout with the pre-loaded poll questions by using the layout panel on the right side of the screen. Click on the layout icon in the panel to switch your view. Layouts allow you to easily customize and re-organize the look and activities you want present in the meeting. You can set them up ahead of your meeting and you can alter them on the fly using prepare mode under Meeting options.
Presenter Only Area – The presenter only area of the Adobe Connect Meeting or Seminar room is a handy tool that easily allows you to store pods/see layouts/chat your other presenters without attendees having any knowledge of this. At V2, we utilize this area to keep presenter notes on the presentation, have an chat pod open amongst presenters to give cues and communicate any issue/questions that may appear during the session. It is also a great way to prep and get ready any new pods you may decide to add to your presentation on the fly. For instance if you decide to add a poll, or bring in a chat pod for the attendees you can select this in the layout menu, and it will automatically open in the presenter only view first, where it will remain until you drag and drop it into the attendee area.
Breakout Rooms in Adobe Connect allow you to separate your attendees into different virtual rooms for group collaboration. The Host simple organizes the attendees into different groups using the breakout view and starts breakouts, and like magic attendees are in their own private virtual meeting and audio conference. The Host can move seamlessly in and out of each breakout room and back to the main meeting. Once you are ready to bring everyone back, then with the same click of a button, attendees return to the main session. You can load separate presentations into each breakout group, separate chats, polls, and any other interactive elements that fit your group activity.