Voice Comments on Google Docs!

Check out this video, fellow teacher Carolyn P. and I made introducing Voice Comments as a cool tool for the 21st Century. Primarily used for the teacher to record voice comments on a student's Google doc, I anticipate that the capabilities will expand to include use for peer editing with classmates, and, as you will hear, use for classes that require audio.  Major props to Sam Patterson for sharing this tool with me! Just search the Chrome Web Store for Voice Comments, connect the app to your Drive, and begin using.

I am very excited to use this tool for providing students feedback on their writing.  The process is much quicker than red penning or creating screencasts of each doc, and I like that comments are linked directly to the document instead of using an MP3 voice recorder app to email a voice message to a student.

This tool is ridiculously easy to use and set up, and as an English teacher who has lots of writing to grade and critique, I'm ecstatic to use it.... wait, did I just say I'm ecstatic to grade?! This must be a cool tool!

Enjoy!

Poetic Voices via BYOD

Lacking time and energy (and talent perhaps),  I haven't written poetry in awhile. Using the Blogger app, I "wrote" this with the voice recorder keyboard on my Samsung Galaxy S3 phone. The voice recorder is close, but not exact (I was also on my Bluetooth ear piece while cooking dinner dictating this piece--multitasking as always). I didn't say the word "whiskey" but evidently my phone heard it (subliminal? subconscious?). I actually like the serendipity in this-- even if it lacks a certain sophistication.

I believe in
my crown.... my crown
and max... big and little things
Micro little the day in the micro com patterns illusions
everything is interconnected
and whiskey we see
here is repeated on the microwave
a land, the star, system is like a microcosm
the ass an electron
we are what we are and everything is
read the rhyme
understand in all things

For the Classroom: BYOD Voice Poems

For a fun (according to an English teacher) poetic activity, have students compose poems by using the voice keyboard on a Google doc.  

1. Working in pairs or alone, open the Google doc on the phone and speak into the phone. 
2. Another student (or the poet) could edit the Google doc using a computer or netbook by inserting line breaks and punctuation (and potentially cleaning up any curses--although the Galaxy S3 will use * for letters in certain curses--go ahead test it out yourself!)
3. Use text tools and images for an artistic flair.
4. Discuss the "hidden meaning" in the poems-- students love to question the validity of a teacher's insight into a poem, now they can be the author and determine the depth in which the poem should be analyzed.