Vocaroo - online audio recording

Our STAR Camp, a tech camp for teachers, begins tomorrow. We will be focusing most of our time on the web tool Voicethread, which I will discuss in another post. But we will also be giving teachers a list of web 2.0 tools to evaluate and create a Voicethread about them. So I am sitting here this evening looking at a list of sites and adding more to the list. I came across Vocaroo during my search.

Pretty nice site. I remember seeing this site one other time but I clearly had forgotten about it. Vocaroo lets you record audio online, save it, download it, even get a QR code linked to it. I was quite impressed. There is no time limit in recording but they do state that internet interruptions could easily affect your recording time.

QR code for my Vocaroo

I was considering the possible classroom uses and I really could have used this site last school year. I had recorded some first graders reading and wanted a safe place to put their voices and share with their parents. I couldn't find anything and didn't do anything with the recordings. If I had remembered Vocaroo, I would have recorded them here, gotten the QR code and sent it to their parents to listen to. That would have been pretty cool. Still may do this since I still have the recordings.

Vocaroo is worth exploring. I am looking for other audio recording sites that are free to use. Preferably something that would let me record and distribute securely.

July- Time to explore- PhotoFunia

I was looking at a blog that I bookmarked a long time ago called Techno Constructivist by Carl Anderson, a teacher from Minnesota. Way back in January 2010 he made a post with a list of sites that were, at the time, safe for kids to use. The sites had no age restriction, required no accounts and could be used freely without violating COPA. So I started perusing the list and, as I would expect, have found that some of the sites have changed. We all have seen sites that start free and end up with those special subscriptions that have all the cool stuff.

Well here is one on the list that I like, PhotoFunia. This is a free online photo editing site. No account needed to play, but they do have a statement about the site is intended for over the age of 13. There are so many options of how you can use your picture. I decided to use one called Big Painting.

Now tell me that isn't cool! I could play for hours on this site transforming my image to all sorts of things. There are tabs for Effects, Labs and Filters. All have a variety of fun effects. Of course I had to do another. Here is the same pic but with the Lego effect.

So much fun! There is also an app for your smartphone.This site would give your students many options to explore. Again, remember the age 13 clause. As an art teacher, this site would give an opportunity to discuss how each technique gives the picture a different feeling. The lighting, intensity of the colors, illusion of texture would all be points to discuss. Go check out PhotoFunia and have some fun with your photos.

June

I'm really trying. I think about writing all the time but I guess that doesn't get the words on the page does it? Well I keep coming back and when I do I try to bring something to share.
We started our third year for our Teacher Tech Camp in the diocese. Today seemed to go well. I don't think we lost anyone. We introduced them to Rubistar. Rubistar is part of 4teachers.org and you can create or find some wonderful rubrics to use. I really love rubrics and this site makes it super easy to make them.
We also shared what we called "talking tools". There was Voki and Blabberize. Both seemed well liked, especially Voki. And we made everyone create a wikispace to use in their classrooms. I worry about this one because we had them all create a K-12 account but they need to verify their emails to go on. I am afraid most of them won't remember to do that. We will know tomorrow when we try to embed something in their wiki. Hmmmm....
Okay, one more cool thing. I have been playing with the magazine covers on BigHugeLabs.com. Fun fun fun! We got a new golden retriever recently so I used a really cute picture of her and created a cover. Again, another fun site.