Second, I'd like to thank these two websites where I read, IN PRINCIPLE, that it was possible. However no one seems to have posted exact instructions so I will here:
Special Hint: in Internet Explorer I had to then right click on
my toolbar and unselect “Lock the Toolbars” so that I could expand my “links” toolbar, like this:
- Click on "Get embed code" and copy the text that appears in the box:
Now click on your "Post to WordPress" button that you installed earlier on your internet browser:
Past the code you just copied into the box entitled “Video Preview” (delete whatever text is already there. On the right hand side give the web address of your blog, your wordpress username and password, and a title and text for your blog post. (You can change this later in WordPress itself).
Your new blog post is now posted by vodpod to your wordpress site on your behalf. Log into wordpress.com and you'll be able to see it, edit it, and if you click on "html" in your edit window at wordpress, you can even copy the vodpod code and put it elsewhere, such as in a wordpress page or in a sidebar.
I've created this page to bring together everything I've learnt about using mobile (cell) phones for audio blogging. You can set this up easily, and for free. Students only pay for a local call.
Warning = AS OF MARCH 2009 THIS WILL ONLY WORK IN THE USA, SINCE UTTERLI HAVE CANCELLED THEIR NON-USA NUMBERS
Students ring a local number, and what they say is recorded and then published at the class website. The two pilot projects I've been involved with are http://wordsworthreflections.wordpress.com and http://australianenvironment.wordpress.com . In each case we added a map with red dots representing visitors to the website, so students could see they had a global audience.
I've created two tutorial videos, below, showing you how to set this up. Importantly, in the tutorials I assume no technical expertise. You should be able to follow the instructions exactly as shown, and have yourself set up within half an hour or so. To set up the students will take a little longer, but it's very easy, just time consuming. A class of 20 students might take an hour to set up, once you've passed around a bit of paper for them to write down their mobile phone number and email address.
Parental permission is a good idea, especially because there is a small cost involved with students ringing a local number from their phone. You can see a letter I used here.
Before I go further I had better post the tutorial videos. They go for about 18 minutes and show you exactly what to do, including how to set up a pin number for the student so they can audio blog from any phone, even a landline, and how to put one of those maps on your website. Here they are:
PART ONE
PART TWO
A summary of the steps:
1. Get parental permission.
2. Create your wordpress.com website.
3. Gather student information - their mobile phones and email addresses.
4. Set up the students at utterli.com and set up cross posting from utterli.com to your wordpress website.
Then you're away!
There are SO many applications for this technique:
- students could be roving journalists, posting one audio story a week about local events and issues
- students could interview family, friends, local community members or experts, with their phones
- students could broadcast persuasive political speeches each week
- or poetry, or short, dramatic stories
- they could give a 'position statement' on a particular issue
- they can record their reflections
- they can role play important historical or fictional people
- they could record 'good ideas', i.e. the whole class, over many weeks, rings and records whenever they get a great idea. The class website would become a repository of the class' great ideas.
Why bother with mobile phone blogging?
In all of these cases, students are developing their oral literacy, learning to speak deliberately for different audiences, contexts and purposes. I have a feeling that a lot of schools don't do oral literacy well. We focus on writing as a means of expression, and then 'do' oral literacy once a year with class speeches, which scare the students to death. Or is that just me??
Please, if you try this system with your students, let me know how it goes.
Below I'll link all my previous posts about mobile phone blogging:
I still have some footage of the students talking about the value of the mobile phone blogging. I'll put this footage up on this page at a later date once I have permission.
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