Today my kids are going to embark on one of my favorite projects that they will do in their time with me. They are going to record commercials advertising Spanish class!
When I was a student, I ofted asked the question, “Why do I need to learn this?” albeit markedly less articulate.
My method of combating this is to have them create commercials advertising the benefits of learning Spanish in sixth grade. I am going to do it using Audacity 1.2.5 and beat up old computers running Windows 98. This version was just released on 10.30.06 and I am curious to see the bug fixes of which it speaks. I am avoiding the new 1.3.2 Beta version because these old machines can’t handle anything beta, except fish. Well, maybe.
This project caught the attention of Steve Hargadon some time ago and he recorded the first (and so far only) interview for a series called Take 5. I imagine it’s because Steve is so busy. Nonetheless, he seemed to like the idea of my kids recording audio and publishing it. I am going to create a slew of Gcast feeds and then upload the audio directly from these computers into the Gcast feed when the kids finish. No copying to a thumb drive, no having to copy via network, just straight to the publishing with them! I will certainly screen the, but don’t anticipate any problems. I am going to create one feed per block, and I am going to begin this new wave with two blocks today. So keep checking back, I will announce when they have been published for your listening pleasure.
On a side note, my upgrade to the stable version of Moodle 1.7 went swimmingly. No troubles yet! So we keep trucking with it, but I still would like more feedback, so let me know what you think!
OK, OK. So, I’ve added another Take 5 short, and am working on some others…