An Attempt at Audio Tools: My Voki Moose

I love the idea of adding audio to any piece of work. In the past I have assigned students Photostory projects on the water cycle and they would have to read a script to narrate each page. They loved the interactive component and had even more fun presenting their work. When I saw that we were going to take a look at other audio tool options I was very excited and eager to learn more!

I visited three websites during my exploration of audio tools this week: Audio Pal, Vocaroo, and Voki. In visiting all three and seeing the different options available, Voki was preferable to me by far. Audio Pal and Vocaroo were very basic and simply allowed you to record your voice. In contrast, Voki was very interactive. I was able to choose a background setting and a character or avatar. Once I recorded my message and played it back the avatar's lips moved along with the audio. I may be a little biased when it comes to Voki because I have seen other students (not in my class) use Voki presentations on Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. They not only enjoyed having a choice in the presentation and the aspect of recording their voice, but they were also entertained by the final products. Little did they know... they were learning while having fun!

There are a variety of ways that these audio tools can be incorporated into the classroom or library. As I mentioned with the classes above, students can create a biographical presentation on a famous American or famous person in history that they are learning about. The only drawback with that, however, are the time constraints. It is a little difficult to record a full report in only 60 seconds, so perhaps students could use a Voki as the introduction (ex: "Hello. My name is Abraham Lincoln and I was the 16th president of the United States. My friend Johnny is going to tell you a little more about my life."). Students can also use Audio Pal or Vocaroo in their ILA classes for an author's chair presentation. I like to have students share their writings and during our poetry unit they were very eager to present their creations. This could be a creative way to hear students' work without the intimidation of presenting in front of their classmates. 

I was very apprehensive about recording my voice and posting it to my blog! I have to admit... I must have recorded it eight times!!! Below is a screen shot of my Voki Moose - click him to hear my audio message!

Source
Voki, audio file download. http://www.voki.com/. Voki, n. d. Web. <http://www.voki.com/>.