Using Google Voice for Classroom Management

This math teacher (Sara) at Nokomis High School does an excellent job describing how Google Voice can be coupled with a teacher's cell phone for management and home-to-school communication.  She also gives some examples of how it can personalize learning for her students.

Sad News...Drop.io Removed Voice Recording Feature, but There Are Some Good Alternatives!

I was incredibly sad to read that as of Oct 1st, Drop.io has removed all voice recording on their site. Drop.io was by far my favorite site for easy podcasting, video and image storing and that has now come to an end. However, I would like to pose some nice FREE alternatives to Drop.io below:

Google Voice
I am a big fan of Google Voice for their recording feature. First when you create an account, you can get a local area code number (so that students could call from a land line). In addition you can set up the number so it goes right to a unique greeting in voicemail. All the messages are stored in a private space on Google Voice as MP3 files.

iPadio
This is a free podcasting site and can be used internationally. The phone number is not toll-free but you can use cell phones. The bad news is that you have to register your cell phone number so you can only use a couple different numbers at a time to connect with the site.

Yodio
This a free audio recording/podcasting site. Your phone does not have to be registered with the site to use the site (which is nice) and you can create one teacher account for all the student's to record into.

Tumblr
The Tumblr blog allows anyone to post images, video, text and audio directly from their basic cell phone to a Tumblr blog. The only thing I don't like is that I can only have one phone number associated with the blog at a time.

Geograffiti
Leave an audio voicemark from you cell phone in a specific location on a Google map.

Google Map Mashup
Post audio from a cell phone on a specific location on a Google map.

UhaveAudio
You can record up to 60 seconds at a time with the phone to web recorder and it is a toll free number.

Cinchcast
You do not have to be registered with the site to make a podcast. You simply call in to the Cinchcast number and record your podcast that is then posted to a space in Cinchcast.

Phonecasting
Once you create an account, you can use a phone (any phone) to call in and make a podcast. The podcasts are housed on the Phonecasting site but do have ways to post on other sites or download the files.

Using Cell Phones & Google Voice in Foreign Language

My co-instructor Jeff Stanzler sent me this Educause article about a Spanish teacher who started using Google Voice with his students for oral language activities. While I have been talking about the potential benefits of Google Voice and foreign language, this is the first time I have really seen it put into practice. Here are a few Key Takeaways from the article:

• To pursue a paradigm shift in education with limited finances, schools should consider taking advantage of ubiquitous cell phone technology for pedagogical purposes that square with best practices within appropriate disciplines.
• New Internet SMS and messaging services are proving especially useful to language teachers, turning the focus away from the particulars of language and writing and toward whole language oral output and pronunciation, even at the beginner level.
• Cell phones give faculty access to students both in and out of the classroom, providing greater power to instruct, persuade, cajole, encourage, motivate, and engage.
• Students who record their voices in computer language labs or using cell phones become more engaged and invested in those potentially public recordings.

The Author (Peyton Jobe) describes how he uses Google Voice with both upper and lower level Spanish students:

"Cell phones offer an accountability tool for teachers inside the classroom. As an example, for lower level classes I can instruct my students to form small groups and, within a given time frame, call my Google Voice number and record a narration of an illustration or picture sequence. In the higher level classes, I can ask groups to come up with a succinct recorded comparison/contrast analysis of two different perspectives (textual and/or auditory) on a given subject. Either way, embracing whole language oral output turns the focus from the particulars of language and writing to whole language and pronunciation. It also allows for efficient instructor identification of common problem points."

Create Oral Quizzes & Speech to Text Transcripts with Google Voice

The voice mail web resource Grandcentral is now Google Voice, and there have been some big improvements. Google Voice is still in private beta (you can request an account), but fortunately I have been able to use my old Grandcentral account in Google Voice. After a couple weeks of using it, what I find useful about Google Voice over other uber voice mail systems is that you get a unique local phone number (thus not having to give out your personal cell phones or landline number). This is an excellent feature for teachers who would like to be able to communicate via their phone with students and/or parents but would rather keep their phone number(s) private. Teachers can now give out their local Google Voice number and set it up so that when students and/or parents call it can go directly to the Google Voice voice mail to take a message or directly to a phone of their choice (cell phone, landline...etc) to answer. Google Voice has a wide variety of free features (some of which are offered on other web-based voice mail systems) such as...

1) Unique Greetings for Callers (This is wonderful for creating oral quizzes)
2) Documentation of SMS text messages and message sending
3) Documentation of every voice mail (MP3 recordings that you can download)
4) The ability to record live phone calls (SUPER COOL!)
5) Record of all your missed and received calls
6) The ability for one phone number to ring on many different phones (great for businesses and fund raising)
7) Speech to Text Transcripts of every voice mail (Great for hearing impaired and interview transcripts, will explain below)
8) Notifications (SMS or Email) each time you have a new voice mail
9) Call Screening (you can decide whether or not to answer as you listen in on the caller giving their voice mail message!)
10) Do Not Disturb option to send all calls directly to voice mails (great for oral quizzes, will explain in the section below).
11) Create call widgets for your blog, where people can directly call from the web. (here is mine below...feel free to try it out! I have my Google Voice going directly to voice mail)

Classroom Connections
Oral Quizzes
So many foreign language teachers spent a lot of class time on individual oral quizzes (because they often do not have another mechanism to capture the quizzes), while a few schools are lucky enough to have language labs, many language teachers struggle with how to capture oral language development. Google Voice's unique caller greetings and "Do Not Disturb" features are excellent for disseminating, capturing and archiving oral quizzes. By creating a unique greeting with the quiz question(s) and setting up the calls to go directly to voice mail (no annoying rings on the teachers' cell phone or landline), students can call in to the Google Voice number, hear the quiz, and then speak their answer(s). When finished the oral quiz will immediately be documented in the teachers' private Google Voice file as an MP3 file. The teacher can receive a text message or email when there are new quizzes in her/his account. They can hear the quizzes over their phone or listen to them online. They can also send feedback (oral or text message) to the students through Google Voice. As a result, the teacher not only has a running archive of MP3 files of students' oral quiz (and improvements in language skills), but also a running record of feedback sent to the students.

Hearing Impaired Students
Hearing impaired students can take full advantage of the free transciption feature. This is a great option for HI students participating in group work (they can still get phone calls and have them transcribed). In addition, they can take advantage of using SMS texting in the Google Voice to respond to group members. A nice record of all group converstaion can be captured in Google Voice.

Document Parent-Teacher Calls
Teachers can also take advantage of the live recording feature. Where they can record any phone call when speaking spontaneously with a parent. It is important for teachers to document their conversations with parents (and students). With the press of one button, teachers can instantly start call recording (the parent/student on the other end of the line will be informed that they are being recorded).