Welcome to “Getting Welcome to “Getting Started With Started With Voicethread”Voicethread”

Click on the button on each slide to hear audio!

Congratulations, you’ve logged in to Voicethread successfully!But what now?!We want to start creating our own Voicethreads so, hmmmm, which button do we need to press…make your decision!!

Yes!

This is the best button to presswhen you want to get started creatingVoicethreads.

Hitting will bring you toan area where you can search Voicethreads.

Hitting will bring you to an area Of Voicethreads you have made and Voicethreads that have been shared with you.

Nope! Hitting this button will just bringyou to a kind of search engine of public Voicethreads.

Nope! This button will take you to an area of Voicethreads you have made and Voicethreadsthat have been shared with you.

So now that we have made it to the area where we createour Voicethreads, what next?!

Which button do you think you will press to proceed?Remembering that we need pictures or video as the basis of whatever our Voicethread is about.

Hint: There’s a really big cluehelping you in which buttonto press!

Correct!

Okay that was pretty easy.

Voicethread makes it easy to follow simple steps to createa Voicethread, that’s why they made the “Upload” button in whiteand the other buttons grayed out.

Nope!

Actually Voicethread won’t even allow you to press this button yet!

After you upload pictures or videos then this button will becomewhite and clickable!This is where you can add initial comments on each of your slides in your Voicethread.

Nope!

Actually Voicethread won’t even allow you to press this button yet!

After you upload pictures or videos then this button will becomewhite and clickable!This is where you can choose who to share your Voicethread and who can see it.

So where are you going to upload our pictures and videos from?!

Well, that’s up to you!!

You will be glad to know there are no wrong answers to chooseFrom on this slide!

Just choose any button below to learn a little bit more whyyou would choose that option.

Choose this if you have pictures or videos you wish to upload on your computer that you are working on.

A File Browser window will open and all you have to do is find your pictures or videos and click “Open”

For example, choosethis if you have asequence of photos thattell a story.

Choose this if you want to recordyourself saying something onyour webcam or you just want totake a picture of yourself on yourwebcam.For example, choose this if you wish your viewers to respond to a prompt you say to your webcam

Choose this if you have picturessaved on websites like Facebook orFlickr. You can also bring in your ownVoicethreads you have made.

For example, choose this if you have aschool trip set of photos on Flickrthat you would like reflections on fromstudents, family or teachers.

Use this if you have a picture you found on a website and don’twant to save it to your computer. If Voicethread likes the URL there will be a green tick, if it doesn’t you will get a red cross.

Use this, for example, if you want to use Creative Commons imagesstraight from the website you found them.

Once you have uploaded some photos, take a look at the Comment button….It’s turned white so you are now able to comment freely!

Clicking on Comment will open up your Voicethread, by clicking the arrows youwill see all your pictures you have uploaded.

But we will click on the Comment button underneath your slide.

Choose one of the below buttons to learn about the differentways of commenting. No wrong answers!

Guess what? I’ve never used this one to comment!

This is only available to American and Canadian usersof Voicethread.They put in their phone number, Voicethread calls themand they leave their comment. Cool huh?!

I guess users would use this if they are away from homeand still wanted to comment on their child’s work.

Use this if you have a webcam and you want to get more expression into your comments!

You may use this if you have some items to show or some actions you want to show the viewers!

For example, you may have a simple science experiment to holdup to the webcam.

Use this if you wish to use your voice only. Make sure your microphone is not muted on your computer!

You may want to use this if you don’t have a webcam but still want to get some expression and emotion into your comment.

For example, you may want to get across your enjoyment in your voice of a particular part of the Voicethread

This is pretty straightforward; use this if you wish to leave a typedComment.

You may want to use this if you want to reinforce the spelling of relevant words to the student who has created theVoicethread and/or the to the viewers.

Now we need to take care of the most important part of creating a Voicethread; sharing!

A Voicethread is nothing without a number of voices commenting!

So let’s take a look at who we can share with.

This is useful to get a websiteaddress for your VT and you can then email to people to allow them to comment!

This area is good if your school has set up Grade level groups and you only want certain groups to have access to comment.

This area is good if you wishto pick and choose who youwant to share your VT with.

There are a couple of icons shown in Voicethread when you wantto start sharing your Voicethreads.

We need to know which icon does what.

Which icon do you think you would press to allow people tolook at your Voicethread but not comment or edit?

Yes! How did you guess!?

When you click on this beside a group or individual’sname it will turn orangey-yellow.

That person or group will only be able to read yourVoicethread and its comments.

You may want this if you want to share your Voicethreadwith administrators and parents after your studentshave completed their conversations around it.

You choose this if you want the group members orindividuals to be able to comment on your Voicethread.

This is the most popular and the most likely optionyou will choose when sharing your Voicethread.

You will use this when you want your students or peersto comment freely on your Voicethread.

You will choose this if you want the individual or groupto be able to edit the Voicethread.

They will be able to re-arrange or delete the slides,delete comments, rename the Voicethread or deletethe Voicethread.

Choose this option with extreme caution! I would limit this option to fellow teachers who maywant to add more slides

Congratulations!

I would hope now that you can create your first Voicethread.

Create a simple story on Voicethread with at least 4 slides. Findsome simple clipart images to illustrate each part of your story.

Narrate using webcam and audio on each slide. Share it with me by email (cgallagher@isf.edu.hk) and make sure I can comment on it.