Friday, September 23, 2016

Free online teleprompter tool


Being a former foreign language teacher and a current media teacher, I have often had my students do projects where they record themselves.  Usually, it is difficult for them to do their recordings and have a paper in front of them as a cue or a prompt.   While sometimes, we want them to be impromptu, often, a script is a component we want them to use.  I found a free site that allows you to insert your script and it converts it to a teleprompter so students can be more natural when they present.   It could also be used as a cue for teachers when they do a lesson or a training as well.

The site is called Cueprompter and it's a simple, free way to make your video have a more natural presentation.

Once you embed your document into the white box, you press start prompt.  It opens a new window or tab with a black screen (of course, one can choose the background/ text color).   It also has the option of adjusting speed.   Press forward as soon as you are ready to play and it will start your teleprompt!

I think I will encourage my students to use it for their book talk recordings as well as maybe a lesson they will do for digital citizenship.  I think it will make their presentations more natural and we will be able to see their face and not the top of the head that one gets when they look down at a paper over and over for reference.


Friday, September 9, 2016

Access to free videos for all content areas

I was spending some time on Twitter recently, looking for some ideas for my posts.  I came across a link for a site with free education videos for all content areas.  I was very intrigued and had to check it out.  What I found was WatchKnowLearn. This site is amazing.  It features close to or more than fifty thousand videos about every topic imaginable.  The creators of the site list is a free domain to categorize and rate K-12 educational videos.

It reminds me a little of scoop.it or pinterest for video links.  It provides teachers the capability of adding links to videos about topics. After adding the links, a team from WatchKnowLearn sifts through the videos and determines if they are right for the site, they are added to a large database where anyone can access them.

I love, love, love how this site it checked and maintained and evaluated for good sources.  There are many opportunities.   Teachers can actually set up a classroom on the site and assign videos to classes and students. There is a step by step instruction sheet as well as a video about creating the account and the classroom. What's even better, all of it is free!  One tip, someone has to be an administrator so talk to people at your school and see who that would be.  Enjoy!  It's a great tool