VoiceThread Resources

Voicethread Handouts:

Bill Ferriter has created a collection of handouts that teachers can use to structure their classroom work with Voicethread. They include:

Voicethread Overview Handout_Voicethread.doc
This document includes a general overview of Voicethread that covers much of the information found on this wiki page. It also covers the basic steps for creating and managing a Voicethread presentation.

Voicethread Do's and Don'ts Voicethread_Student_Intro.doc
This one-page handout is designed to introduce students to some general tips for participating in Voicethread conversations. While specifically designed for users of Ed Voicethread---a subscription service offered to interested teachers and students---it could be easily tailored for users of free Voicethread accounts.

Tips for Teachers Handout_Voicethread_Tips4Teachers.doc
This handout is designed to describe three specific actions that teachers can take to ensure that Voicethread presentations are successful with their students. It is particularly helpful for teachers that are new to Voicethread.

Copying an Existing Voicethread Handout: Copy Existing Thread
One of the most valuable features of Voicethread is the ability to copy an existing presentation. For teachers who have put together great threads in the past and want to reuse the same presentations, this is a huge timesaver. Copied presentations allow teachers to keep the same images, as well as selected comments. This document includes a quick guide to show you how to make a copy of an existing presentation.

Previewing a Voicethread Handout_Voicethread_Previewing.doc
This handout can be used by students while previewing Voicethread presentations.

Commenting on a Voicethread Handout_Voicethread_Commenting.doc
This handout contains basic information on the kinds of comments that can be added to a Voicethread presentation.

Commenting Language Handout_VT_Comments_Wall.doc
One of the lessons that students can learn while engaging in Voicethread presentations is the kind of language that is productive in collaborative--as opposed to competitive--conversations. This handout can be used to introduce students to the kinds of actions and phrasing that members of ongoing work teams use while working with each other. (It repeats information shared above in handout form.)

The Cultural Photograph Handout, The Cultural Photograph.doc
This handout was created for use with Ferriter's Cultural Photograph project, shown in the sample Voicethread presentations section above.

Welcome to Our World Handout, Welcome to Our World.doc
This handout was created to introduce Ferriter's Welcome to Our World project, shown in the sample Voicethread presentations section above.

Powerpoint Template for Quotation Voicethread Web 2_0 Quotes.ppt
Often, teachers want to use quotations as the focal point for conversations on Voicethread presentations. The easiest way to incorporate quotes as Voicethread slides is to create a Powerpoint presentation with the quotes included, and then to upload that Powerpoint presentation---rather than individual images. This Powerpoint---which was used in the creation of a Voicethread presentation on digital tools---can be used as a template for any teacher interested in creating a Voicethread focused on quotes. The color schemes match the Voicethread color schemes nicely.

The Holocaust and Hitler's Youth Template Template_Holocaust_ppt
This Powerpoint can be used by teachers to engage their students in a conversation about the Holocaust and Hitler's Youth. Specifically designed to force children to consider why humans fail to stand up to injustice, it includes images and quotes from Nazi Germany. This Powerpoint can be uploaded as is to Voicethread and used as a presentation. Teachers can also use the suggested comments---found in the notes section of each individual slide---when recording. Alternatively, this Powerpoint can be easily tailored for use in your room. Slides can be added or deleted---and comments can be edited.

See how one group of eighth grade students wrestled with issues related to the Holocaust and Hitler's Youth by visiting this ongoing Voicethread presentation.

Sources for Images:

Wikimedia http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
Wikimedia connects to a collection of images and videos posted in Wikipedia that are often copyright free---or free for use in most situations with nothing more than a citation of the original source. This site will introduce you to the Wikimedia collection, which is sorted by category and nothing short of impressive.

Morguefile http://www.morguefile.com
Like Wikimedia, Morguefile is designed as a warehouse of images that are copyright free and available to any user for any project with little restriction. The photographers who share their images in Morguefile are working to create a set of reference images on common topics for the world to use. They take great satisfaction in lowering the barrier to incorporating high quality photography into school-related projects and often only request an image citation or an email for a picture to be used. As described on Morguefile's website, "The purpose of this site is to provide free image reference material for use in all creative pursuits. This is the world wide web's morguefile."

Flickr Creative Commons http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/
Flickr also has an absolutely INCREDIBLE collection of images that photographers have made available under "creative commons" licensing. Images found in Flickr's creative commons gallery can literally be used for almost any project that is related to education with nothing more than a credit to the original photographer.

While students in middle and elementary school should never be encouraged to explore Flickr without adult guidance, teachers can easily create collections of images for students to choose from for any project and make them available on classroom or school wikis. Because the quality of the images shared in Flickr are so remarkable---and the size of the Flickr CC collection is huge---this is a resource that teachers are going to want to explore when creating Voicethread presentations.

Image Codr http://www.imagecodr.org/
Image Codr is a free service that can help teachers and students to act responsibly when it comes to the use of Flickr images. By coping and pasting the link to a Flickr image into Image Codr, users are automatically informed of the range of uses allowed by the original photographer and given an automatically generated Creative Commons citation for use in digital projects.

The Library of Congress Print Reading Room http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/catalog.html
Recognizing the changing nature of new media, the Library of Congress is working to make as many images as possible available to users in a digital format. This link connects to the Library of Congress's Print Reading Room, which contains almost a million digital images. What makes these images particularly valuable is that they are grouped into user-friendly categories like "People," "History," and "The Environment."

NASA's Image Gallery http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/index.html

Trek Earth http://www.trekearth.com/
As described on the Trek Earth website: "The underlying theme of TrekEarth is learning more about the world through photography. TrekEarth fosters this by allowing photographers to display their work grouped by regions in a supportive and orderly environment. This is accomplished by an easy-to-use system which encourages people to critique each other's work. Integrated with this system are forums designed to encourage discussion about specific photos, countries, and general topics."

Cagle Cartoons http://cagle.msnbc.com/
One of the most interesting uses for Voicethread has been to engage students in conversations around political cartoons. The images are interesting to students---and are great ways to teach students about bias and hidden messages. This website is a terrific source of political cartoons from around the world. The images are categorized by topic and the artists are categorized by country. If you decide to work with political cartoons, consider sharing images from artists in different countries who have different perspectives about the same issue.

Source: http://digitallyspeaking.pbworks.com/Voicethread

VT Rubrics:

______________________________________________________________

Notes; Not finished yet NBW

Hi there - privacy will only really be an issue for you if you are allowing your students to 'browse'. As far as threads created by yourself and your students go, the whole thing works a s a gated community. Only invitees can see content. Make sure you publish threads with content moderation enabled too. If the kids are exploring the wider VT universe, then perhaps you could get them to construct their own avatars (you can do this using a range of media), and do a first name only thing. I guess it depends on your intentions.http://voicethread.ning.com/forum/topics/privacy-issue-with-minors

http://voicethread.ning.com/forum/topics/i-am-so-confused-by

A subscription to the secure K-12 ed.voicethread network gives every student their very own account (student email addresses not required) and students can then choose which classmates to collaborate with - but the projects are still viewable by the teacher.

Here is my hang-up with ed.VT (it isn't the money)...it doesn't allow for spontaneous, authentic commenting to take place. We used ed.VT last year at my school and we had an exchange student create a VT project in math class. A woman from englahd wanted to comment but was unable to do so because she wasn't part of the ed.VT network. I know they have some sort of way to invite folks in from the outside to comment, but by the time this happens the authenticity is gone.

We'll continue to use VT with our older students by having the teachers with their pro accounts initiate the thread. We'll then have students who have created their own accounts at VT come in and comment.

http://www.mguhlin.org/2008/12/voicethread-reneges.html

<<VoiceThread (voicethread.com)

Resources

	What is a VoiceThread
	VoiceThread from UNC
	VoiceThread Tutorial

Examples

	100 Days in Kindergarten
	Spanish VoiceThread
	Computers in our Past and Future
	Poetry VoiceThread
	13 Colonies VoiceThread
	Using the Big 6 with Technology: A Study of Water Erosion

Issues

	Cost ($20) for continual use; register for an educator license
	Students need a login and password

Ideas

	Foreign Language- discussions of images
	Science - records of science experiments
	Social Studies - reports, historical reenactments, debates
	Language Arts - literature circles, poetic expression
	Higher Education - Discussion of issues
	Debriefing for field trips

Presentation Voicethread

http://voicethread.com/help/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=373&page=1
In order for your all the members of a Group/Class to consistantly have access to, and see each others work everyone in the Group should use the following workflow to share.

Click the 'Share' button
Click the 'My Friends' button at the top of your contacts list
Select your Group
Click 'All' to select all the members of the group(you can select them one by one if you wish to share with only part of the Group)
Click 'Invite' which will then grant all the selected people the right to view and comment on this particular VoiceThread, causing it to instantly show up on every members MyVoice page.

If everyone in the Group follows this workflow then all of the VoiceThreads will properly appear within the right Group when you click on the 'Showing all' button on your MyVoice page.

you are automatically made a co-editor of any VoiceThreads that your students create, so you can delete any of the pages and any of the comments within any of their VoiceThreads.

Or do you mean can one single class(a group of users) collaborate on building one single voicethread? The answer to that is yes, a creator a VoiceThread can make anyone else(or a lot of people) co-editors. Here's a link to a Tutorial on Sharing. http://ed.voicethread.com/share/8889/">http://ed.voicethread.com/share/8889/

Return to Top

Wooster School - John D. Verdery Library

Homework Resources

Helping Hand Links

Bill Ferriter has created a collection of handouts that teachers can use to structure their classroom work with Voicethread. They include: