Voicethread: Conversations and Collaboration in the Cloud

The High School recently subscribed to a cloud-based application called Voicethread. On a basic level, Voicethread is an online presentation platform where slides are created and a person’s voice can be recorded over each slide. Voicethread can be used for more than this, however. When you consider the below features of Voicethread, a sea of opportunity arises as to how you can use it in your classes beyond basic presentations.

Voicethread allows users to upload, share, and discuss documents, presentations, images, audio files, and videos through a series of slides. Users can then comment on the slides containing these media. Comments can be audio, video, or text-based. Voicethreads can be shared easily between users for collaborative purposes. Students and teachers can comment on each other’s comments to create a dynamic, asynchronous, online discussion on the content presented. Comments can be threaded. Voicethreads can also be easily shared and embedded for a broader audience to view or give feedback. Voicethread allows students and teachers to be both producers and consumers of content and critical thinking processes.

Voicethread naturally works well in English, World Language, EAL, and Social Studies classrooms, but it can definitely work well in all subject areas. Check out these examples collated by Voicethread to see how it has been used in almost all subject areas.

Mark Mouck recently used Voicethread in his IB English class to practice IOCs. His goal was to give students an opportunity to practice their IOC in an asynchronous environment, and then receive feedback from both peers and the teacher in the Voicethread platform. This then freed up some class time to work on other needs. You can view and example from his class here.

Luxia Yan started using Voicethread in her Chinese class to help students prepare, practice, and build confidence for IB oral assessments. In the first round of practice, the students recorded their oral in Voicethread, and then Luxia gave feedback in the moment. She used to use Garageband for this oral  purpose, but she is finding that Voicethread is easier to access, share, and maintain a record for the oral assessment. Furthermore, students can look at and describe a picture that is embedded in the Voicethread. In the second round of practice using Voicethread, students will share their orals with other students so they can give feedback to each other along with the teacher in the Voicethread environment.

Voicethread isn’t limited to collaborations and interactions in a single school. Here is an example of Voicethread being used for a global collaboration project between students in Beijing, Shanghai, and Helsinki in an IB ITGS class I taught. In the process of researching and putting together their content, the students used a wiki to collaborate. They then created the final presentation collaboratively in Voicethread.

Voicethread is accessible via the Google Apps launcher as it is integrated with our Google Apps suite. SSIS high school students and teachers don’t need to create accounts as you automatically have an account associated with your SSIS Google account.

Voicethread also has mobile apps that you or your students can use to create and/or comment on Voicethreads. You can download the iOS app here and the Android app here. Both are free. Login with your SSIS credentials. Voicethread is installed on all of the HS iPads, which are available for check out.

If you would like to discuss ideas to use Voicethread in your class and give Voicethread a try, let me know and I will help you get it going with your class.