【Vocaroo Voice Message】: The voice recording service

What is Vocaroo?

Vocaroo- The premier voice recording service

Vocaroo (http://vocaroo.com/) is an easy and free service that allows users to create audio recordings for use in slide shows or in blogs and websites without the need to install any software. You do not even have to create an account to use Vocaroo. All you need to provide is a microphone.

How to use Vocaroo?

To create a recording just go to Vocaroo.com, click record, grant Vocaroo access to your microphone, and start talking. After completing your recording, Vocaroo gives you the choice to publish it or to scrap it and try again. When you press "publish" and embed the code in your website, you will see a lovely little player which you could click to play your voice.

Step 1:  Go to Vocaroo webpage, and when you are ready,
press on "Click to Record" button to start your recording.

When you have finished your speech, press "click to stop".

Then it lets you to rerecord again if you are unhappy with your recording.
If not, click the link to save.

Ok, it's now pretty much done.
Now you can copy the code and embed
into your blog or website that you would like to.

Below is an example of audio file I have recorded:

           

Audio and voice recording >>

Why do teacher and students like Vocaroo?

1. Free and Easy 

Vocaroo has a clean webpage and it allows teacher and students to start recording straight away without having to sign up to be a member or install any additional software. And the instruction in its website is clear enough, even first time users can definitely understand how to use it. Vocaroo also allows users to download the recorded audio and save it as MP3. 

2. No fixed limit on message length 

This means that teacher and students can use Vocaroo to record as long message as they like. However, people have to be aware that even brief internet connection outages can cause recording to be stopped or to fail, and with longer recordings the chance of this increases. Despite of these, I still believe that no fixed limit for recording time is always the biggest benefit of Vocaroo.

3. Time Saving

Teacher and students can use Vocaroo at home to record their speech beforehand and directly play it in the classroom. For example, teacher can assign a task for students and have them to respond through Vocaroo at home and embed the link of their responses into their blogs. The students do not have to stand up one by one and tell the teacher their stories. Besides, if the teacher was unable to come to school on a particular day, he/she can also inform students to listen to his/her pre-recorded Vocaroo file from the class blog so that they won't miss the content of the class.

How can Vocaroo be used in a language learning context?

1. Story Telling

The teacher can start the lesson by showing an example to students- telling them a story, for example on the topic of "the most happiest day in my life". After that, teacher has students divide themselves into groups of 3 to 4. This is to provide them more practising opportunity later on when they narrate their stories to the group members before recording. Then, the teacher can offer students some stimulus by asking them some guiding questions such as "What has happened in the day?", "Which situation made you so happy?", "Who was in the scene?" and so forth. After that, teacher can have students to record at home, either in pair or individual and post it in class blog. Then teacher can provide feedback to students on the pace/organisation/grammar of the story. The students with the best stories can also come in front to present to the whole class in the next lesson.

2. Information gap activity

Teacher starts the lesson by giving the students an extract (the beginning part) of a story in the class blog. Or another way to provide the students with stimulus is by showing students some pictures. Then the story continues to go on by having a student to record a short piece of story recording everyday. The teacher can have students to draw lot before starting to decide the students' sequence of continuing the story. This activity is kind of engaging and motivating because there is an information gap and the students feel curious and they want to know how other students are going to continue the story. In this way, their interest and motivation are aroused. And at the same time, their oral skill are trained because they have to organise their ideas and sentences as well as to choose the right words so that they message can be conveyed effectively.

SOME LIMITATIONS OF VOCAROO

1. One limitation of Vacaroo I have found out when I compared it to Sound Cloud- another audio recording tool (https://soundcloud.com/) is Vocaroo does not have the ability to allow the teacher or the listener to provide feedback by tying it at the exact second which Sound Cloud can do. This turns out causing the teacher to face some difficulties if he/she wants to give precise feedback on one particular moment at which the students say a point incorrectly, use the wrong words, or to praise a students for saying some points particularly well. 

2. Besides, Vocaroo does not have voice graph like what Sound Cloud has. I personally think that the voice graph would be very helpful for students when they are practising pronunciation and intonation as the graph allows the students to see their own rhythm of speech clearly and therefore, teacher can tell them which part need to be emphasised or lowered.

The Voice graph which Sound Cloud possesses but Vocaroo doesn't have it.

【MyBrainshark】: Video Presentations at Anytime, Anywhere

What is MyBrainshark?

Homepage of myBrainshark

MyBrainshark (http://my.brainshark.com/Home.aspx) is an application that provides the opportunity to make instant creating, sharing and tracking online and mobile video presentations. With MyBrainshark, users can quickly turn an ordinary voiceless file into a voice-enriched presentation which can be accessed any time and anywhere. Additional features such as polls and quizzes can also be added. The final work can then be delivered via a Web link or can be embedded in a Web page, and users can track various statistics, including who viewed the presentations and time spent viewing it, and receive reports and alerts of viewing activity.

In brief, these are basically the five contents that you can upload to myBrainshark. They are PPT slides, Words Documents, Videos, Photos and Podcast (MP3/Voice Recording).

How to use MyBrainshark?

Generally, people can use myBrainshark to:

• present tutorials, 
• narrate products demo,
• share experience, 
• tell stories, 
• describe a biography 

and many things more that you can actually think of. 

Besides, this webpage is free of charge and generally require only 20-30 minutes to create it depending on the length of content you would like to present. ALL you need is access to the internet and the sound enabled on your computer. That's it! However, do bear in mind that you actually would need to sign up before using it.

So, in fact, there are just few simple steps to create a myBrainshark presentation, as you can see from the chart below. You can also click here to view the step-by-step tutorial presented by myBrainshark or here for the tutorial by my lecturer, Russell Stannard. 

Easy peasy steps of using myBrainshark

After you have finished producing your presentation, these are the things which you can do:

• Editing your presentation by adding /deleting slides 
• Add in some questions (polls/survey) at the end & have the viewers respond to you. 
• Download the whole presentation to your computer/phone for free. :)

The following is an example of MyBrainshark final outcome:

WHY IS MYBRAINSHARK USEFUL FOR TEACHERS AND STUDENTS?

 1. Motivating and engaging (Autonomous learning)

Students get the chance to decide on the content and the organisation of their own presentation. Then they are also encouraged to speak in target language at their own pace without feeling as tension as presenting a PPT presentation by standing in front of the classroom. In fact, using myBrainshark may be a better idea for students who just started practising doing oral presentation because they might not be able to use language so spontaneously and myBrainshark allows editing and it provides students opportunity to draft their speech first before presenting!

2. Students acquire Organising and Speaking skills

Since students need to upload files into myBrainshark and use voices to narrate it, students would have more room to practise using their voice to convey messages, such as they need to speak clearly and at a favourable speed and intonation. Moreover, they can learn how to organise the sequence of their points so that the viewers can make better sense of their speech by linking it to the slides shown.

How to use myBrainshark in an ELT context?

Individual work:  

Teacher can suggest students some topics to be discussed (eg: About me, the book I love the most, the nicest place that I have been to & etc.) and have them vote for their favourite one. Then teacher can monitor students' progression and give them a hand throughout the preparation stage of the presentation.

Pair work:

Teacher can post a couple of images on the class blog and have students download them and create a story themselves by arranging the images based on their own will. Teacher can let the students to create the drafts of their story lines in the class first, then they upload the images and do the recording at home by themselves.

Group work:

A video can be used to replace the images, and have students record their own videos (perhaps record during role playing in the class) as the continuation of the first video. This activity might be time consuming, but it actually depends on what are the aims & the learning outcomes the teacher opts for. 

SOME LIMITATIONS OF MYBRAINSHARK

I couldn't actually find out the exact limitations of myBrainshark. However, I have seen some of my colleagues' pages comment on these following points:

• MyBrainshark only allows for voiced-based presentation, so students may have the script prepared and they just read it aloud. Therefore, its activities are kind of unsuitable to be used for language speaking skills assessment. 

• Making a voiced presentation is a time consuming process and it often creates lots of noises, hence it is not suitable to be carried out in class.

However, in overall I do not feel that those have been mentioned are big problems because I believe that the effort which have been put in and the frequent practices which have been carried out by the students are far more valuable than the final result. And, I think it is very worth while for teachers to spare more time on students in scaffolding and guiding them to solve problems patiently. In fact, students' creativity cannot be forced as well, it is similar to what the saying has said- Rome wasn't built in a day~ :)

【Intervue】: The video recording tool for Q&A.

What is Intervue?

This is the homepage of the Intervue website.

Intervue (http://intervue.me/) is a website which allows people the opportunity to post questions about topics online and have people record their own 60-second video as a reply to those questions. The link of the questions can be posted to anywhere and assigned to whoever the author wants. It is done in an involving manner as this site favours the recording of video replies as the way in which insight and knowledge is shared. 

How to use Intervue?

Intervue has a very clean and clear webpage. One who has some basic technical knowledge will definitely know how to start using this website without much assistant. The following are five easy peasy steps to start setting up questions based on a particular topic:

This is the look of the page after you have set up your questions.

Next, in order to respond to a person's question in Intervue, you must have the link for the question. Once you have logged in to the question's page, a screen will appear and your webcam will be activated and is preparing to record. Click on the RED button at the bottom to start your recording. While responding to a question, you can watch you own facial expression from the screen. And bear in mind that, the maximum recording time is just 60 seconds. That is the end of  the recording after 60 seconds as the video will stop automatically by then. Therefore, it is very important for the responders to keep the answers concise.

This is how your monitor screen will look like when you are making
a recording of yourself answering a question.

Why do teacher and students like Intervue?

1.  Intervue has provided people an opportunity to have real live communication on the Internet. It motivates people to exchange ideas beyond the face-to-face tradition, which this could be the more relaxing one because it is not a direct live video. Intervue is a kind of private platform for people to communicate without feeling tensed or shy. Many people will still find Intervue a rather new and special way to interact, therefore they will feel more than happy to do so. 

And once a video reply has been posted, then other people can proceed to comment on it and remark how accurate that particular answer has been. Plus, each and every video reply that is posted can then be downloaded as a MP4, taken on your thumb drive and consulted when you are offline.

2. Students can practise their oral skill when the teacher has posted up some questions and have them answer the questions at home. As the students know that there are teacher and other students will be their audiences, they will organise their ideas to make sure that all can fit in 1 minute as well as will practise several times before sharing the one which they feel most satisfied with others. Besides, they can also be aware of their facial expressions and eye contact as well.

3.  It is of a higher possibility that students' oral skill is getting better and better every time they practise speaking by using Intervue. Therefore, Intervue can also be used as an e-Portfolio for teacher and students to keep an eye on their own progression of language speaking.

4. More expert students can also set up their own questions with the guidance from teacher and raise a discussion on a particular topic in a group manner. It is kind of motivating when students can come out with own questions which they feel curious about how the other students are going to respond to. This provides students a sense of ownership and they will feel happy when they get the reply from other students.    

How could Intervue be used in a language learning context?

1. Set up a topic and several questions

To start to use Intervue in most language learning context, a teacher can firstly suggest some general topics to students. For example, holiday, musics, festivals, free time (typical good day), role models, dreams and so forth. The topics covered have to be associated with something which have been taught in the class. Then, the right of topic choosing must be with the students because they are the people who are going to respond to the topic. Hence, the topic must be something which is appealing to them and can bring up their interest. The teacher can have the students vote for the best topic that they would like to respond to and set up questions together with them.

2. Do preparation before recording

Students can be guided by the teacher to create a framework/note on what to say in the video recording. For example, the questions is describe about your role model, and teacher can ask some guiding questions like "what has he/she done?" or "what values does he/she have?" for the students to make the people their role models. In addition, the teacher can also write some vocabulary items on the board to help the students in their preparation. After that, the students can practise saying to their partner first before starting the real recording. Teacher might also do an example before they start their recording.

** Speaking is the most cognitive activity to do, therefore with more speaking practices carried out, the students' capability to think fast would be enhanced.  .

3.  Responding to classmates' videos

Teacher can encourage the students to view each other's videos and have both teacher him/herself and other students to comment on them, perhaps from the content or grammatical point of view. The videos offer students a chance to share their stories and opinions with other students and the comment feature is a way to allow the students to express their ideas on the videos and provide the speaker some feedback so that he can make the speech better next time.

Some limitations of Intervue

1. Intervue needs a rather fast internet connection so that it can perform its function to the fullest. Otherwise, the video might be just stuck at the middle of playing or recording.
2. The video recording is always not spontaneous if it's used in a language lesson, as students are allowed some time to do preparation and perhaps make a list beforehand. However, I think this should not be a big problem because students' effort to practise and their improvement in speech and cognitive thinking are much more worth while.  

【Bubblr】: the comic strip making tool

What is Bubblr?

Bubblr, a comic strip making software by PimPamPum.

Bubblr (http://www.pimpampum.net/bubblr/) is a free online software created by the company PimPamPum which allows its users to create a short comic/picture strips using the photos from Flickr.com. The users can also use their own photos if they have their own Flickr account.

ScreenShot 1: This is the homepage of the Bubblr website

How to use it?

 In order to create a comic/images strip in Bubblr, there are just a few easy and user friendly steps to follow. Here you go!

This flowchart shows the five simple steps to create Bubblr comic strip.

Why do teachers and student like Bubblr?

1. Personalisation- Bubblr is all about personalisation and ownership. It gives teacher and students the opportunity to create own images strips based on own creativity and ways of expressing ideas. Students' creativity and thinking skills can be enhanced when they are planning their ideas as well as choosing and organising the images and putting in bubbles.

2. Engaging- It also has provided a chance for teacher to make the classroom learning environment to be more engaging because Bubblr is a combination of things such as choosing pictures and put in captions which students would be enjoy doing so much!

3. Building up writing skills- Students' writing skills can be built up slowly when they are trying to opt for the most suitable words to put in the bubbles in order to describe their images and convey their messages successfully.

How can Bubblr be used in ELT classroom?

1.   Historical timeline- Bubblr would be a amazing tool used to illustrate a historical timeline because by its dynamic timeline structure.

For example, teacher can have students to produce a Bubblr strip to narrate the history of the students themselves. It could be a picture for each year, starting from the year they were born until the year which they are in now. 

2. Procedure describing- Due to the scrolling linear feature of Bubblr, it can also be a great tool for students to describe the step-by-step procedures of performing an activity. 

For example, the procedure of making a chocolate cake and the correct steps of brushing teeth. With the accompany of images and bubbles, the strip will look livelier if compared to the traditional flowchart.

3.    Story creating based on images given by teacher- If a class has a Flickr account, it then allows the teacher to direct students to a certain resource and certain images to use. 

For example, the teacher can upload a couple of images onto Flickr and have the students access them using the class username, then the teacher will ask the students to rearrange the images based on their imagination, and create a short story from that. 

Some limitations of Bubblr

Despite of all the usefulness which have been stated above, Bubblr actually does have limitation as well.

1. Image placing- Once the images have been dragged down to the linear timeline structure, they cant be move around just by dragging. If the user has mistakenly put an image in a wrong place, he/she has to delete the image and add it again at the right position.

2. Bubble size- The thinking/ text bubble cannot be resized. Sometimes, the whole image would look nicer if the bubble can be resized and be put at the right position. 

3. Bubble arrow- the arrow can just be moved around at the bottom of the bubble, but not at the side. It would make the placing of the bubble difficult occasionally if the user wants to point the arrow to something at the side of the bubble and do not want to block some part of the image.

Below is an example I did using Bubblr. The topic is Italy- which is one of the country I like the most. And this strip is showing some of the Italy main attractions and also my favourite Italian food. Enjoy and start to make yours too! (^_^)

For more detailed information, please visit http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/bubblr/index.html. This is a teacher training video specially produced by my lecturer, Russell Stannard on the topic of how to use Bubblr.

【Lyrics Training】: Enhancing Listening Skills and Vocabs through Songs

Sample song from Lyrics Training - Call Me Maybe

WHAT IS LYRICS TRAINING?

Lyrics Training is a website which allows teachers and students to read and listen to the lyrics from music videos, and then fill in the missing lyrics as they go along. Bear in mind that this site is NOT SIMPLY KARAOKE but is also pretty useful for students of foreign language to improve their listening skills because they are required to identify words from a song. It can also be used as a fun and interactive means by language teachers to assist their students by introducing new vocabulary as well as grammar to them.

HOW TO USE IT?

There are seven different songs' languages to choose from (see Screenshot 2.1) in Lyrics Training. That means this site is not merely functional for ESL/EFL students but also for other users who would like to develop their listening skills and vocabulary of some other languages. However in our ELT case, we choose English as our songs' language.

Screenshot 2.1: Languages available for lyrics training.

After that, you can start by searching for lyrics by typing song title or artists' names into the search box. Once you have decided on a song, you will be told which kind of accents the particular song is sung in and the difficulty levels of the lyrics chosen (see Screenshot 2.2). 

Screenshot 2.2: Songs' accents and difficulties levels are both shown.

The next step is choosing a level- Beginner, Intermediate or Expert (see Screenshot 2.3). The level chosen determines how many words in the lyrics are missing and students have to fill in. After this, all you go!

Screenshot 2.3: Three different Levels are available to choose from. 

p/s: What is absolutely the highlight of this tool is that while you are hesitating about filling which words into the gaps, the song stops automatically and waits for you to do the job. And, in case you feel the need to listen to a particular line again, no problem!

Screenshot 2.4: Some buttons to help you during training

WHY DO TEACHERS & STUDENTS LIKE LYRICS TRAINING?

Teachers and students like Lyrics Training might be due to the following few reasons:

a) It is absolutely FREE where teachers and students can have
    access to it anytime and anywhere.

b) It is incredibly simple to use and also could be rather
    interesting because the students could choose the songs
    which they like or would like to learn.

c) This tool could be highly appropriate for students who
    are strong musically and spatially (visually) [according
    to Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences]
    since they will be more likely to develop listening skills
    and learn vocabulary items faster and easier through listening as
    well as watching the music videos frequently. 

d) Turning the classroom atmosphere to be more relaxing
     by using songs could help much in language learning
     because students' affective filter will become lower by
     having lower level of anxiety and higher level of motivation 
     and confidence. 

HOW COULD IT BE USED IN LANGUAGE LEARNING CONTEXT?

1) (a) Some pre-listening activities can be carried out before
          listening to a song. For examples,
          (i) show the students some song-related pictures or
          (ii) ask some topic related/ guiding questions 
    This is to activate students' schemata and have students to
    contextualise the whole picture in order to have a rough
    idea on what the song is all about.
   
     (b) Then, teachers can project the music video on the
           projector screen and the whole class can enjoy and
           fill the gaps together.

2) For higher-levelled students, teachers can divide them into
    pairs/ group of three and have them listen then write out
    the entire song lyrics together on paper before comparing
    their outcomes with the original lyrics.

3) Teachers can also set listening to a particular song as homework.

SOME LIMITATIONS OF LYRICS TRAINING

• Sometimes it could be too difficult to listen properly to what the singers are actually singing due to the fast rhythmic patterns of the songs. Some singers' voice tones are not appropriate for certain mode (eg: Beginner) as well (see Screenshot 2.5).

Screenshot 2.5: Problem of inappropriate singer's voice tone pointed out by one of the users.

• The lyrics will stuck halfway sometimes although the music is still on which causes the users have to restart all over again. It could be quite frustrating, really! 

That's all about it. ** HOPE YOU ENJOY IT! **

【Dvolver Movie Maker】: Learning Language through Animated Characters

Home page of Dvolver Movie Maker Site

 WHAT IS DVOLVER MOVIE MAKER?

Dvolver Movie Maker, over 8 million movies have been created in it! This is a FREE website which includes a lot of chit chat and various interesting characters. To be precise, this site enables both teachers and students to either express their own views or practise their language usage by directing their own short movies using their own imagination and language.

What's interesting is Dvolver offers its users with wide range of choices throughout the movies making process. For example, there are more than 10 beautiful backgrounds and 30 animated characters to be chosen from. Additionally, the users are free to choose any plot and put in any lines which they would like their characters to say. After that, more scenes can also be added on to turn their dialogue into an awesome movie!

HOW TO USE IT?    

There are just 8 EASY PEASY STEPS to create your own movie by using Dvolver.

Look at the slideshow below!

SAMPLE MOVIES

The followings are the sample movies which I have created through Dvolver. 

Have a quick look and hope you'll enjoy it!!

Movie 1: The Elf''s Revenge 1 (To be continued..)

Movie 2: The Elf's Revenge 2 (The End)

WHY DO TEACHERS & STUDENTS LIKE DVOLVER?

Developing students’ writing and creative thinking skills is a vital part of learning languages. Using Dvolver Movie Maker as a tool to create digital comics in learning allows students to experiment and utilise these skills. As compared to face to face speaking, this way of communication enables students to express contents confidently through the movie characters so that constraints caused by psychological barriers to production on second language (L2) learners are eliminated and pressure related to productive skills is minimised.

Dvolver Movie Maker can be very helpful for both lower and higher-levelled students as for the previous, it maximised the use of simple language and it allow use of a variety of language registers for the latter. Its enjoyable format also helps enhance students’ motivation to learn languages by using an active learning tool and promoting active and creative approach of students. Indirectly, Dvolver can also increase students’ self-esteem because using the interesting characters and backgrounds to supports the students’ stories allows professional result which students can feel proud of.    

HOW CAN I APPLY DVOLVER IN AN ELT LESSON?

To implement language learning lessons utilising Dvolver Movie Maker, it is necessary to have a classroom equipped with computers and the Internet connection. The task can be equally completed as homework. Students can work either individually or in groups to come up with a solution.

There are plenty of possibilities on how to explore Dvolver in an ELT lesson:

•  Use movies to talk about holidays, school, work, etc.
•  Encourage students to use movie’s characters to  comment on local or national celebrations, cultural
   events and social trends.
•  Have students place value or reflect on a particular
   experience in a movie.
•  Illustrate a language problem.
•  Have a character to explain a grammar point or go  through a vocabulary students were taught in the  lesson.
•  Create a drama using the short movies created by students.
   Students may serialise their dramas by creating a new episode/scene each day as part of a continuing story.
• 
  

The results can be presented or emailed to the teacher and/or students. Another possibility is to select the best movie between all the students and place it on the school website if there is one.

SOME LIMITATIONS OF DVOLVER

• Users can only choose two characters and type in six characters' line in each scene. And, maximum three scenes can be made in each movie. This could lead to a monotonous atmosphere and a quick loss of interest for higher-levelled learners.
• The movie characters cannot speak aloud and they possess the same facial expressions at all time.
• Movies cannot be edited once they have been finished created. Users have to redo all over again if there are mistakes.
• There are no "Rewind", "Pause", "Fast forward" buttons when the movie is playing. It could be difficult for teachers if they want to stop and explain a particular dialogue to their students.
• Users are unable to make the movie into full screen mode.
• Mandarin language cannot be used as one of the medium for the dialogue.