Procedural skills, sketchup and vodcasting: distance teaching of design drawing skills and student learning autonomy

The popularity of sites like YouTube demonstrates the potential preference for users to use video podcasts (vodcasts) as an instructional tool. As educators have been encouraged to become more literate in authoring Web 2.0 technologies, the implementation of vodcasts as an effective pedagogy has been increasingly used in educational settings. The recent proliferation of distance education courses caused educators in higher education settings to consider why some programs are more suitable for distance education than others, and whether procedural knowledge and skills that are required in various industries may be able to be delivered using contemporary technologies. This article discusses the efficacy of using vodcasting as a pedagogical tool, in developing procedural knowledge and skills in computer aided design and drawing, to pre-service teachers studying via distance education, and demonstrates the capacity for vodcasts to foster autonomous student learning.