At lunch I was looking through my newsreader and saw a post by Chris Craft about a web based screencasting tool called screencast-o-matic. I took a look and boy is this thing impressive. With just a few mouse clicks you can create a good quality screencast with audio. You can designate if your screencast is public or private, add notes at specific sections, embed your screencast in a web page or blog, or export it as a static file. This is about as easy as it gets. Below is a quick example.
A tool like this allows you to very quickly create screencasts and changes my thinking about how to use them. For example, if I get an email from a teacher regarding a technology question, or with an inquiry about how to do something, I can now very quickly access this tool, create a quick little tutorial with audio narration and then post it to our staff blog, or send an email link to the screencast.
I’ve been reading about this application a lot for the past week. I started wondering if and how it could specifically be used to help teach English Language Learners. I wrote about a few ideas, and am interested in getting people’s reactions and additional suggestions.
I wrote about it here:
http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2007/06/05/screencasts-esl/
Posted on June 5, 2007 at 8:51 am.