Voki - Week 4 Activity

Success at last. You can see my Voki in the top right corner of my blog! It took longer than expected to create. This is because I had created a voice recording on my iPhone to use for my Voki but getting it from the iPhone to the Voki was a whole other kettle of fish (pun intended here, you may laugh :P If you don't get it, never mind haha).

For starters, a voice recording on a iPhone is a M4A file. I know, you are probably thinking what is that, so was I. Anyway, long story short, you need an MP3 file to add to a Voki. Here's how to convert it, head to this site: http://www.nch.com.au/switch/mp3.html?gclid=CJW2ha3anqoCFcYNHAod4Dp25Q and download the 'Switch MP3 Converter Software'. It is a sinch to use.

Voki's in education, I can see their purpose and I can also foresee their terrible overuse. Kids may get distracted by the novelty of it all, and lose focus in the task at hand as well as the negative of only having 60 seconds however I think the benefits in this case outweigh the negative. They are a wonderful tool for which you can lend your voice or audio too. They are user friendly, visually exciting, and can distract the child from what may have seen as an instruction, to see it more as an exciting cue to learn.

I was also interested in Oddball, Voki's creator and they have any novel technologies available on their website http://www.oddcast.com. Many however require a webcam.