I can’t wait to start using Voicethread next Term! I first heard about this tool at the AATE conference in July, and it turns out a few of my colleagues have been using it for awhile…if anyone has links to Voicethread projects they have done with their students I’d love to see them!
My initial thoughts are that I would like to use Voicethread for:
- Year 9 poetry unit – students compose poetry and read it aloud with accompanying images for other students to view. Perhaps also some collaborative poetry writing?
- Debating Training – One week debates. Students can record a real debate. Starts with 1st Affirmative speaker, then following speakers get 24 hours each to respond; runs like a ‘real’ debate.
Some great tips and ideas for using Voicethread can be found on Wesley Fryer’s blog. I have just joined the English Group on the Voicethread Ning, and am hoping to get more ideas and tips from there.
Kelli McGraw 
#1 by kellimcgraw on August 24, 2008 - 3:51 pm
Also a great wiki on using Voicethread for education.
I am reading the page on Best Practice…lots of great ideas:
http://voicethread4education.wikispaces.com/Best+Practices
#2 by VictoriaM on August 28, 2008 - 4:53 am
Interesting. Lately I’ve been researching what sort of edutech tools are out there, and I had not yet seen Voicethread. It seems to be like an enhanced PowerPoint tool…maybe similar to SlideRocket but perhaps more user-friendly. I imagine your students will love this!
#3 by Mark Carls on August 28, 2008 - 11:45 am
Kelli, great blog post and thanks for joining our Voicethread Ning group at: http://voicethread.ning.com/
I was setting that Ning group up and all of sudden people started joining, so I’m still adding to it and hopefully the network will continue to add resources. I’m hoping the groups will help organize people and their thoughts.
I agree, though, that wikispace above is a great resource!
Voicethread is very easy and free to set up, plus you can add students under your account, OR buy into ed.voicethread.com and be on a secure educational site.
Victoria, the difference with Voicethread is that you can upload a pictuer, then have people comment on it, some teachers even put up worksheets and then have students draw on them and show how they would solve the problem, here is one VT that the Mathcast Team has done:
http://voicethread.com/share/8759/
Or, check out their wiki:
http://math247.pbwiki.com/Mathcasts+Library
Good luck, have fun with these. I played with it first with family pictues, loved it and am now looking for good educational VT’s.
Mark Carls
#4 by kelli on August 30, 2008 - 6:54 pm
Thanks for the encouragement Victoria! I’ve tested out Voicethread on the school computers now and it seems to work OK – I still have to test out the quality of the voice recording there though. There is often a lot of ambient noise in a school – not to much to use Voicethread, I hope!
#5 by kelli on August 30, 2008 - 6:57 pm
Thanks for the extra resources Mark – I’ll be showing the Maths Voicethread to our Maths teachers next time I get a chance!
I am also loving that teaching students how to find pictures on the web for Voicethread will let me open up a discussion about Creative Commons licensing, and issues of copyright in the ‘sampling culture’ of the digital age.