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Using VoiceThread as a Tool for Language Learning

   Voicethread  allows students to comment on a document, image, or video on the page.  They can comment by recording audio, video or typing their comments.It is a great tool to encourage students to talk to each other, listen and think about each others’ ideas.The linguistic skills that this tool can evaluate are Speaking and Listening.

The following activities can be created using VoiceThread

1. Share with others: Teachers can begin each semester with a teacher-created Voicethread just to get students used to viewing and commenting. Later,teachers can move to more specific Voicethread designed to extend learning of content, vocabulary, pronunciation, and even to share writing. 
2. Sneak Preview:Another way to use Voicethread is to preview a topic before class. In this case, students were about to start a unit called Hobbies and Leisure activities and the teacher wanted to students to get an idea of the topic  discussing this in the class, the same few students usually respond . By using Voicethread, every  student had the opportunity to share their ideas with the class.
3. Browsing: Voicethread works with a high-intermediate-level class also as a way to respond to a Ted Talk or a video made by the teacher .Students recorded an interesting fact they learned, explained whether they felt, and discussed their opinions about it.  While responding, they had to use vocabulary words from the material.

  Tips For Using VoiceThread For Learning

• Create a VoiceThread group for the students
• Start with a required voice/video commenting activity for the students.
• Build accessible VoiceThreads.

           Speak Up

   Voice Thread is an excellent tool for both teacher and student and avatars make it fun.  Lessons can be prepared in advance with voice over which permits multiple views for clarification or the absent student. It is also an easy way to incorporate technological and/or primary sources into lesson.It is a powerful tool for students to create, collaborate, and share all kinds of videos.

Creating New Stories

Storybird

   For many years the use of technology has been expanding in every aspect of life and in education is not the exception. Classes have become more dynamic, 

making learning more effective.Teachers have many tools in hand to develop the class and this tool is one of them. This tool promotes student writing and reading 

thus creating a different way to evaluate these skills in the classroom.

List of ways that this tool can be utilized in the classroom:

1. Group story: Teachers assign a group story for students to work on together to bounce ideas off one another. Each student is going to share with their classmates their opinions and feelings about the topic assigned.
2. Movies: Students will create different movie trailers for books that have been read in real life. Students will use their imagination and creativity at the time to complete the assigment.
3. Perusal Activity :Students will not only strengthen their writing, but they can also improve their reading comprehension or even take pleasure in reading.

Tips for teachers to use storybird

1. Create a Storybird classroom to keep track of your students' progress.
2. Make sure there's a good Internet connection .
3. Encourage students to ask questions and provide feedback for their peers.

Imagination and Creativity

     Storybird can be used in a variety of ways to enhance student learning and help students develop concepts. The versatility of
Storybird means that it can be used for more than just exploring storytelling. Teachers can adapt lessons around Storybird in a variety of ways that make learning interesting for students.

Online media in Education

   Blogs for Education

           Blogger is a useful tool that can be use in education since it favors dialogue and creates the opportunity to meet other people in which both the bloggers and readers exchange opinions, ideas, and feelings. Teachers can use a blog to publish materials and activities that the students can access to and where the students can make comments. Teachers  can also let students to create  their own blogs according to the topic that is being seen in class. The linguistic skills that this tool can evaluate are reading ,writing and maybe speaking .

The following activities can be created using Blogger

1. Project work:  A blog is an ideal space for developing a project, especially if the project is a shared  between even classes in schools.
2. Journals: Students can write about their lives, feelings, opinions, etc, and be encouraged to read about the other class and respond by writing comments.
3. Class assessment: Students should be encouraged to post their writing homework on the blog instead of only giving it to the teacher.

Tips To Use Blogs in the Classroom

1. Read other Blogs
   Take the time to read other classroom and student blogs.
2. Plagiarism
   Explain to students that plagiarism will not be allowed. Student contributions must be their own work.
3. Interact with other Bloggers
   Encourage collaboration by having students network with bloggers and follow other student blogs. 

          An Ingenious tool

       There are many reasons why teachers may choose to use blogs with the students. One of the best reasons is to give the students the opportunity to writing. In addition, the teacher is the only person who reads students writing. With blogs, students can find themselves writing for other people for example, their classmates, students from other classes, or even other countries.

Google Education

 

A creative way to create documents

        Google Docs is an online tool for creating text documents that can be easily shared with other people. This tool can test a linguistic skill such as writing.

Using Google Docs in Your Class

 Projects

                                     Google Docs allows students to work on their projects anywhere. When students submit research papers through Google Docs, teachers can offer immediate feedback and request changes.Google Docs allows students to investigate and add information from the Internet to the document they are writing.

Collaborative Story

                                  With Google Docs students can work on a Doc at the same time. So they can work together on a story, a script for a role-play, or other kind of writing project. They can use the comments feature to give each other feedback and make decisions together.

Brainstorming

                                               Many students are visually and can see their own ideas better in a graphic presentation. Shapes, arrows, and colors work better for such students than spreadsheets and lists. Using the different graphics in Google Doc students can see a flowchart of their ideas.

Google Docs is very useful, but teachers hate to know how to use it. Here are some tips for them:

1. Allow others to suggest edits in a Doc.
2. Check spelling,punctuation and grammar.
3.  Use list of keyboard shortcuts to save lots of time while using Google Docs.

Using Google Docs in the classroom

   Google Docs is constantly evolving, adding new features, and becoming more useful for teaching and learning. If you have not put Google Docs to the test, try with new ideas use Google Docs.