After watching the video of voicethread, I started getting excited. :) Voicethread seems like a great delivery technology for the classroom and the possibilities for this tool are endless.
Teachers can use this program to comment on students work in the classroom and students can even comment each others work.
With the variety of commenting features, this means that students can participate in whichever way they feel comfortable with. Teachers can also use voicethread to post an image of something students are learning about and have them comment it. For example if a teacher posts an image of the countries of the world, students homework could be to pick a country and comment an unusual fact about this country.This program could best be used with students from grade 5 and up. Younger students could possibly get involved but parental help will more then likely be required.
In high school, we had to deconstruct images and explain why things had been structured the way they were. Voicethread would have been an engaging way to make this topic a bit more engaging for all the students in the class.
Voicethread emphasises the first principle of the Engagement Theory (Greg Kearsley and Ben Schneiderman, 1998) and incorporates communication, planning, managment and social skills to increase the motivation of students.
PRO'S -
- Fun
- Interactive
- Easy to use
- Accessible
- Engaging for all students
CON'S -
- The more comments there are, the more bandwidth hungry it becomes which means the longer it will take to load. This could be a hassle if all students are participating on the one image
USES IN THE CLASSROOM -
- In class projects
- Homework
- Communication
- Image deconstruction
Grace xx
I can imagine using this with the younger classes when teaching them about accepting others and how you should treat people. You could ask them to comment by voice (if too young to type text) what they think about different images portraying different social and cultural scenes. The higher grades can also use it regarding acceptance in society but the images could be more complex.An image of Hitler or Nelson Mandella, Martin Luthur King, Woodstock etc. Ask them to comment on the role important people have played regarding social change in our life time. Just an idea; but like you I think it can add to the engagement and meaningful understanding of many lessons.
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