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).

BASIC Cell Phones Can Be Assistive Technologies

While we are starting to see cell phones and software being developed specially for the blind and deaf, I wanted to take a few minutes and explore how BASIC cell phones (without the costly software) can be assistive devices for hearing impaired and visually impaired students. I am NOT an expert on assistive technologies, but I have been hearing from more teachers on how their special needs students are benefiting from cell phone technology, so I wanted to share what I have learned.

For the Visually Impaired
A VI teacher in one of my courses (Julie Burger) shared with me that her VI students often are the last to get to experience new technologies because the technologies need to be modified for the visually impaired. For example digital resources often need to be modified for screen readers. However, Julie became very excited about the possibilities of cell phones in learning because she realized that this would be one time that her VI students could be on the forefront of technologies (possibly even being able to introduce their new mobile tool discoveries with their classmates without disabilities). A basic cell phone offers the ability for visually impaired to do the following;

1. Listen to any webpage
2. Listen to newscasts and podcasts
3. Send Speech to Text emails
4. Send Speech to Text Blog posts
5. Send Speech to Text Group posts (to places like Yahoo Groups)
6. Send Speech to Text Calendar appointments and meetings
7. Receive Voicemail reminders
8. Listen to text messages

Hearing Impaired Students
While VI students can take advantage of speech to text, and text to speech options in cell phones, HI students can take advantage of these same options on a basic cell phone but in the opposite directions. For examples, HI students can type in text and it can be sent to other students/teachers cell phones as a audio message. A basic cell phone offers the following options for hearing impaired students to better participate in their everyday class activities:

1. Send text messages that can become audio web-based posts (such as podcasts)
2. Send text messages that can become audio Voicemail
3. Receive an audio Voicemail message that can be transcribed into a text message
4. Read podcasts/audio broadcasts on their cell phone
   

The following are some free applications that couple with basic cell phones for students with assistive needs. The best part of these resources is that they can be used by any student (Univerisal Design), and they are a great way for teachers to be inclusive when developing assignments, group projects, or even basic class activities.

Free Mobile Resources for VI and HI Learners
Jott (Speech to Text Translation, emails, appointments)
Jott Feeds (Listen to text-based webpages)
Rocketron (Listen to news feeds)
Rminder (Text to Speech reminders)
PingMe (Text Message Reminders for groups and individuals)
Text4deaf (2-way text messaging, keeps tracks of texts, sends to individuals/groups) (Thanks to
Karen Montgomery for showing me this resource!)
ChaCha or Mymiamia for Google Searches (Text Message for HI students)
Dial2do (Speech to Text)
YouMail & GrandCentral (Transcriptions of VoiceMail)
Sendible (Text-Based Evites)
Voki (Text to Speech Avatars)
Hey Cosmos (Text Message to Speech Surveys and Quizzes)
Google Voice (Voicemail with Speech to Text Transcription)
Phonevite (Voice Message surveys, quizzes, and feedback)

I know a few others also are researching and using cell phones as assitive tools, please share your ideas and resources.

Web2.0 Voicemail: A Teacher's Uber-Management tool!

While we are familiar with the basic voicemail systems on cell phones and landlines, they are often limited. In the web2.0 world there has emerged new and FREE uber-voicemail systems. Some examples include Grand Central, YouMail, and Amphibian. These mail systems allow for the following;
1) By passing the caller and going right to voicemail.
2) Creating custom greetings for individual callers or groups of callers
3) Being able to send text message feedback directly to the caller
4) Documenting all voicemails as an MP3 file
5) Transcription of voicemails right to your cell phone as a text message file minutes after the voicemail is left.
6) Searchable voicemail messages
7) Caller ID (even from cell phones!)...
8) The ability to reply in text or audio to voicemail messages on the web directly to cell phones and/or email account of the caller.
9) A private phone number (so you don't have to give out your real cell phone number)
10) A private phone number that will ring as many phones as you wish (cell, landline...)
11) Call Recording on the Fly

So how does web2.0 voicemail help teachers?
Here are just a few ways (at least these are ways that my YouMail and Grand Central accounts have helped me with my own students)

Transcription of VoiceMail
Since YouMail and Grand Central both send me a transcribed text message of every voicemail left on my account, I no longer need to call my voicemail to find out who called and the message that they left. I also have a transciption of numbers left in my voicemail (instead of having to remember them as I listen to the message). This can also be a very nice feature for hearing impaired students to be able to participate in voicemail services.

MP3 files of every voicemail, the "by pass" feature right to voicemail (so my phone does not ring), & custom greetings.
Every message left in my voicemail is automatically stored on my YouMail account online as an MP3 file. While this is helpful for documentating phone calls (espeically from students and parents), but it is a great feature for oral quizzes. Students can call in to the YouMail account, listen to the unique custom greeting that I set up, and they can "speak" their quiz. The quiz is then stored in my YouMail account (I can listen through my mobile phone and send a text message or voicemail evaluation back the student OR I can listen online at my YouMail.com account and send the text message or voicemail feedback to the student through this account). Since these are private calls, the quizzes are kept private...but I get to keep the MP3 files as a record of the student's progress over the school year. I can even sort my YouMail account so that I can look at all of one individual studnet's oral quizzes at one time.

Group Messaging
I can send out messages to groups of my students or parents at anytime. In my Youmail.com account I can send out reminders about upcoming assignments or ask them to call in an oral quiz.

Private Phone Numbers
Grand Central gives out a private phone number, so teachers do not have to give out their real cell phone number to their students. Instead they hand out the private number. This is a nice feature because you can set the number to go directly to voicemail (great for oral quizzes...no ringing or buzzing on your cell phone while student's are taking their quizzes). In addition, you can set the number to ring on any phone you wish, so you could set up a student helpline which rotates each week between the students (just change the phone that rings with the private number each week to a different student's phone).

Call Recording On the Fly
Grand Central also has a call recording feature (is this legal???). This is great when you have a difficult conversation with a parent, studnet, or community member and want to make sure that it is documented. You can even start the recording in the middle of the conversation. It becomes an MP3 file in your private Grand Central account!


Something Similar: Slydial
Slydial allows for by passing the caller and going straight to voicemail. It can work with any mobile phone or landline. This is helpful for students who are taking oral quizzes where teachers have YouMail accounts and they want to go right to the voicemail to speak their quiz. Here is how it works...

1) Dial 267-SLYDIAL (267-759-3425) from any landline or mobile phone.
2) At the voice prompt, enter the U.S. mobile phone number of the person you want to slydial.
3) You will be directly connected to their voicemail. Leave them a voicemail.

Grand Central Calling!

A newly acquired mobile resource from Google called GrandCentral works in a similar fashion to the recently canceled PrivatePhone. While GrandCentral is currently in private beta form (you can request an account), I have a feeling that it will soon become widely available. GrandCentral allows you to get a new private number (for free) in your area code. This private number will go directly to GrandCentral's voice mail account or you can have the number ring any (or all) of your phones. For example it could ring your cell phone and landline at the same time! The fact that the number is NOT your real cell phone or landline number is fantastic, so teachers do not have to give out their private numbers to students or parents, but they still have a way to be contacted. Additionally since the number is a local area code, students who do not have cell phones, can call in to the number from their landlines and complete audio assignments and quizzes without charge.

In GrandCentral's online voice mail you can retrieve messages (as audio files) and you can assign specific greetings to specific callers. This is an excellent feature if you are giving a verbal assignment and would like students to "speak" their assignment (such as an oral quiz in a foreign language class or a "think-a-loud" after reading a chapter in the class novel). Also, you can record any phone call at anytime (this is a great feature if you have a difficult call with a parent or student and you want to document what has been said). This is also a nice feature for student's doing interviewing or even podcasting.

At GrandCentral there is another feature called ListenIn, where you can listen to why a caller is calling (for example why a parent or student needs to talk with you) before deciding to pick up the call. This could help teachers better prepare for a conversation with parents.

Teachers can assign different ringtones to different groups of people. So they know when students, parents, or their friends are calling without even having to look at their phone.

GrandCentral could be useful not only with oral homework assignments and quizzes, but also with parent and student communication. I can't wait for this resource to go public!