Teacher Bytes

For those of you who has been reading this blog for the last few months you know that I taught Web Media Productions to a group of 6th graders. The semester is over, the grades are in, equipment packed away, and I have taken time to reflect on how the experiment went. As I look back and look ahead, I have come to this conclusion: it was a successful failure.

To recap, in January my principal asked if I could take one class of 6th graders and do something with the various technologies I have been advocating for the past year and a half. The class would be using blogs, podcasats, wikis, video, and other Web 2.0 tools to complete a variety of assignments. These assignments included school news and in work in each student’s academic classes. My purpose was to demonstrate to teachers and administration how technology could be integrated into everyday assignments and no computer labs would be necessary.

Here are the things I liked:

• The students enthusiastically worked with the technology. Other teachers who observed my students told me they were impressed at how much pride the students took in doing their work. Very few times did I have to discipline a student. There were three students who failed the course but even they did very well when they did their assignments. Also, these students were having troubles in other classes as well.
• Students took ownership in the course and quickly realized their work was out for everyone to see. Some took longer than others but got the point when I was constantly commenting on writing skills, spelling, punctuation, etc…. It started driving home the point their ELA classes mattered. There was also one funny time when one of the students got a response back on her blog from someone outside of school. It scared her. In another incident, a student e-mailed me that there was some inappropriate content attached to one of our videos on YouTube and wanted to know if I could take it down. He was proud of the work he and his classmates had done and did not want it ruined if it could be helped.
• Students realized they were an equal partner in the class. When one of the students taught me how to do something on the blog he later told me that was the first he felt what he knew was important. He when scared when he taught me what I needed to know but bought into the class when he realized I listened to him as a student should listen to a teacher. It was the first time it had ever happened to him. The students worked as a team to solve problems. However, I would send other students to help answer questions and sometimes I let them work it out on their own.

Here are some of the things I did not like:

• Not all of the teachers participated or cooperated. Even after I explained what I was planning on doing more than a few would not help with sharing computers. Even though teachers shared what they were doing in class and gave feedback on my ideas, almost all of them did not follow-up on work students did for their classes. One even got annoyed when she was asked to allow students to do a survey so graphs could be generated, the unit she was on at the time.
• Only two teachers asked how I did something or asked the students to explain what how they did an assignment. Sad considering this was an exercise in showing what the possibilities are.
• While administration was supportive and gave me a free hand to run the course as I saw fit, they only saw half of what the course was about. They loved the videos that were produced. So good the principal has assigned me to do this class on a full-time basis. The idea was for the teachers to see how to do things not me do it for them. In other words, in spite of trying to teach everyone how to fish, now I will be called on to video things in other classes instead of the teachers doing it themselves. This is why I call it a successful failure.

Things I would do differently:

• Say no! At least it sounds good but I loved my students.
• Have a couple of days where we would do nothing but sign up for the accounts needed.
• Make wikis the first assignment so students would have a better overall portfolio platform.
• Work more with audio podcasts but I am sure there will be pressure to get videos out.
• Make sure to have an individual video project so every student would have to demonstrate basic videoing skills before moving on to other tasks.

I am now in the process of designing what I like to call the Multimedia Activity Center or MAC for short (goes well with McCracken Middle School). As this summer project moves forward I will be blogging about that adventure. Don’t worry, I will also be blogging about technology integration as well. It is going to be a busy time.

Do you ever have a lesson you like to teach except for one little thing that confuses everyone and causes the lesson grind to a halt? Whenever I teach Audacity in Podcasting classes, it is trying to explain why you need to add the LAME MP3 encoder separately when setting up to record podcasts. The reason stated by the makers of Audacity is that software patent issues prevent Audacity from including LAME. Maybe I am not doing a good enough job sharing with the class about legalities or maybe another solution is needed.

If PC users wanted a digital recorder without having to add extensions you had to pay for it. Since it is free, most people live with Audacity’s little quirk. Mac users spare us from lauding over Garage Band. However, there is a new recorder which is fairly simple to use, has some nice audio effects, convert files to MP3 automatically without a separate download, and is free, WildVoice Studio.

When you open WildVoice Studio you will see a screen divided into four sections: Show Builder, Mixer, Background Tracks, and Sound FX. The Show Builder is where you will record most of your podcast and put the show together. Here you will find a display that shows your sound levels and control buttons such as play, record, pause, stop, and cut. Once you record a clip it will show up below the display. While there is the ability to cut unwanted audio, it is not very accurate. You will want to record small segments of your podcast then assemble them later into a finished product. The mixer allows you to control volume levels of your microphone and other parts of your podcast such as the FX. Background tracks allow you to upload audio files such as music or pre-recorded interviews and insert them into your podcast later. The section that is the most fun to play with is Sound FX. WildVoice Studio has several audio clips such as a gunshot, a rooster crowing, a toilet flushing and others. You may also add other audio effects to this section thanks to programmable radio buttons. Needless to say, a podcaster could go crazy adding various effects while recording.

Once you finish recording you will assemble your clips in any order you wish. Next you will click a rather large Save + Publish button to save your work. The software saves the podcast as a WildVoice file but then switches to converting the file to MP3 automatically. Once you are done the software tries to get you to upload the file to the WildVoice hosting site but you can skip this step if you wish to upload the file to another site.

WildVoice Studio is in Beta so expect various bugs to come up and it does occasionally crash. There is one problem the folks at WildVoice need to address soon, it only works with Windows XP. You can make all the snide comments about Windows Vista you want but it is not going anywhere for a few years. Therefore, I hope a Vista version will be coming out soon. Overall, once some bugs are worked out this could become an Audacity killer and the answer to the prayers of those with Garage Band envy. One thing I would hope for in the future is the ability to have more control over editing clips. A cursor you can place on the display along with zoom in and out, undo and redo would help make this product more attractive to experienced podcasters. While I won’t ditch Audacity yet, I will keep watching and experimenting with WildVoice.