VoiceThread

Our assignment for today was to view two of Sir Ken Robinson's lectures, Changing Education Paradigms and Schools Kill Creativity, and then comment along with our fellow classmates using a tool called VoiceThread.

VoiceThread allows a teacher, or student, to display presentations through one or more slides with accompanying audio.  Those who view the presentation may reply by leaving audio, video, or text comments within the presentation.

This program is pretty cool. You can adapt a VoiceThread to teach or illustrate ANYTHING!  Want to show someone how to change the oil in their car step by step?  Make a VoiceThread.  Well, what if they have a question?  Tell them to leave it on the VoiceThread so it can be answered.  Problem solved!  Not only can you illustrate step-by-step instruction, you can also compare and contrast or you might have an open forum discussion.  The possibilities are endless.  This program can be useful to so many departments on so many levels of so many schools and institutions it's ridiculous.  Why more people don't know about this thing is beyond me.  Needless to say, I'm a fan.  

I plan to try this out with my Civics class just see where it might take my them.  I'm going to pose a topic of discussion and then see where they go with it.  I just want more out of some of my students.  Much of our class is discussion and there are students who don't participate.  I believe that if I use this tool the won't have a choice but to participate and they might actually enjoy becoming involved.

VoiceThread fits in with ISTE NETS T standards across the board.  It inspires learning and creativity from both student and teacher.  It is definitely a digital learning and assessment tool.  There can be no argument that teachers using this tool would exhibit a professional, technologically savvy, collaborative learning environment.