Thing 07: Audio Tools

Now THIS I am excited about.  As a foreign language teacher, it is critical that we assess our students' abilities to SPEAK the foreign language.  One key problem: TIME!!!  If kids work in partners to create a dialogue (say a customer and a waiter in a restaurant) and there are 10 groups creating 5 minute skits, you spend an ENTIRE class period just listening to performances.

Being able to record audio is a game changer.  This is super convenient for students who have stage fright and for me who has a serious fear of losing instructional time!

For my lesson activity, I went with the most basic service, Vocaroo.  The screen was simple an easy to use.  I simply clicked Record, recorded a brief description of myself, then emailed it to myself.

https://vocaroo.com/i/s10pKOm5Pjxn

Feel free to listen in to learn a little more about me (if you can speak Spanish, that is!)

Another way I am considering using this, is to record the dictation portion of exams while I do them live.  This way, if a student is absent or come in late, I don't have to read all of the dictations over and over again.  Our final exam dictation can take anywhere from 20-30 minutes.  Imagine having to do that 3-5 times!

To summarize...Vocaroo: GAME CHANGER!