Podcasts: Soundcloud using Screencast-O-Matic

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This is what all flipped classroom teachers dream about, especially if you're a teacher who's well into practicing going green.  It's also perfect if you are just starting out. Podcasts are an excellent way to enable students to be accountable for their own learning, involve and engage them in mentoring and teaching others, and an excellent way to help the environment. From papers to sound waves, this is the way of the future.

How can you record your lesson, begin a book chat, or provide a preview or review of your lesson using technology? The podcast! My favorite podcast or recording tool to use is Soundcloud. It's easy-to-follow instructions bring comfort and ease.  A free account provides about 3 hours of free service to record, and the site also has upgrade options. Soundcloud is a service you can use to record anything you want to say.  As a teacher, you can record important study notes, give a summary of a story, or explain basic sentence structure for students, which is something that needs constant reminding.  Other things you can record are a book review and some added notes on the year's syllabus and expectations.  This is something you can use for just about anything.

This is a short book review I recorded about Avi's The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle using Soundcloud.


For those who would like to take a more hands-on approach, you can use Screencast-O-Matic, a website that enables recording screen movements and sound, to enhance the teaching and learning experience.  I used Screencast-O-Matic to create a mini tutorial on how to create a soundbite, or recording, on Soundcloud and then embed it into a blog.  It's easy to download.  I have MacBook Pro, and installation was incredibly easy.  Once I was finished with my video on Screencast-O-Matic, I exported the video to YouTube following the prompts.



Using these sites will revolutionize your classroom and enable you to reach your students way after school hours.  You can record lessons for them to complete at home, and then you tackle "homework" at school for a more one-on-one experience with students.  Also, if students are completing a task online, you can provide a video or a step-by-step audio recording to guide them.

Now, please, I know this sounds like I'm some sort of technological guru.  There is nothing in this world that would sound more prestigious to me, but the truth is that I'm not an expert in the ways of technology.  Soundcloud, Screencast-O-Matic, and YouTube are incredibly user friends. All I did was follow directions.  If I can do this, so can you! It's really that simple. 

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