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Start your 2008-2009 classroom digital scrapbook *RIGHT NOW* on Voicethread.com!
9 CommentsGood morning folks!
September is almost over and believe it or not the school year soon will be too. I am kicking myself for not suggesting this earlier – so sorry – but anyway – if you act quickly, there is still time to get started!
Let’s face it, the school year is a BLUR of lessons, projects, activities, assemblies, inspirational moments, heads-down hard work, triumphs and celebrations. Why not capture it all for posterity by creating a class Voicethread that you AND YOUR STUDENTS add to all year long?
What’s a Voicethread? See below…
Super simple and incredibly powerful, Voicethread is arguably *THE* best tool available today for creating and sharing collaborative presentations that combine interactive photographs with text, audio and video commentary. If you get started now, you will EASILY be able to chronicle the entire school year from start to finish, with your own students providing voice commentary as things happen, and at the end of the year you can EXPORT the final product to a .MOV file and burn it on CD or add to it with iMovie (or the like).
To get started, you need a Voicethread account. Go to http://voicethread.com/ and sign up. Then, you have three choices: upgrade to the K-12 educational version, ‘Pro’ account, or your free, limited account. The free account is just fine if all you want to do is create a single Voicethread for your class (those accounts are limited to a total of three). The K-12 version has extra features for class management that may help, but for most, the free account is just fine. (Please see the comments below for more info about these options -thanks, readers, for filling me in!)
Once you have your account ready, I have found the EASIEST way to use Voicethread with students is to ADD AN IDENTITY TO YOUR ACCOUNT. The main downside here is that you have to sign the kids in and out (otherwise they have your password) and that any identity on your account has full rights and can delete content. I’ve NEVER had a problem though and suspect you won’t either. Here’s a look at the page with my account and a test student identity:
Note: the student’s avatar was created with BuildYourWildSelf.com (great fun in its own right); you could also use this Portrait Avatar Maker. Once your student identities are ready, you can create your class Voicethread and start adding photos. Here’s a shot of one I just created, I am signed in using a student identity, and the student is ready to record comments on the slide:
(Photo credit: Old Shoe Woman on Flickr)
Here’s the best part: every student can comment on every slide, and they can do so whenever there is free time, before, during or after school, provided you log them in first.
Think about this for a second … with about 10 minutes of setup (no joke) you have a living, growing, audio-video digital scrapbook you and your students will create over the entire year. THE HARDEST PART IS REMEMBERING TO TAKE A LOT OF PICTURES (and then choosing the ones to upload)! Remember to also get PARENTAL PERMISSION if needed before putting any student faces on the web. Student identities within Voicethread should be anonymous (as in my example) and students need to know not to mention their own names or those of other students. Beyond that, I’m telling you, this is a CINCH, an absolute SLAM DUNK, we had first grade students doing this last year, virtually unassisted! When you’re done, you can buy an export credit for $2.99 and have the .MOV file for archival on CD and distribution to your students.
You can DO it! Get started today, before too much of the school year is already gone!
Hope this helps,
-kj-
9 Responses to “Start your 2008-2009 classroom digital scrapbook *RIGHT NOW* on Voicethread.com!”
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Great to see your post about Voicethread which I think is one of the most powerful FREE tools out there. For primary age children it is completely barrier-less! Even if the Voicethreads are only shared within the class and amongst their peers, it generates a community of use and sense of collaboration like no other tool. Thanks for the thoughts.
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I have to agree with Tom regarding how a project like this would create a sense of community in the classroom. Not only that, but parents would love being able to watch the year unfold. This is a wonderful application idea for Voicethreads!
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Thanks for commenting Tom and Caroline – the beauty of this is that it’s so easy to set up and so simple to maintain, then, whamo, at the end of the year, it’s a living, breathing class yearbook. Honestly, if I had my own classroom, I’d have one of these going in a heartbeat. I’m hoping some of my colleagues at my school give it a try! -kj-
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Unless it has changed, teachers can sign up for a free account, then click the Go Pro button, click the “K12 Educators Click Here” link, and request a free Pro account, which is not limited to 3 voicethreads. Love the scrapbook idea. Will be sharing your post with our teachers.
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Hi Janetta! Thanks for commenting. That is worth checking – I think it actually has changed, now that ed.voicethread has launched. Anyone know for sure?
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Yes, you can still have a “pro” account as a K-12 educator. When you register click on the K-12 small print in the window and you can put in your school email. They will send you an authorization and you are all set. I have created teacher accounts and then class accounts so that student avatars can be uploaded for users and students are logging into the class account, not the teachers account. It adds one more layer, but it keeps kids out of teacher accounts.
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Glad to hear the free Pro account is still available for educators. Class account is a good idea, Cathy.
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Kevin,
Thanks for posting this great idea. We are beginning a pilot in our district with a few teachers to document and build a case for a possible district-wide implementation of VT. I’m going to add your post to the short list of valuable resources we are using to support our teachers. There a many resources on the web for VT, but few are truly as valuable. Thanks again! ~Lee -
Lee, my pleasure, as always! :-)
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