Voice Recording in Office 2010

Oh no! You were using voice notes in Word documents, you just got updated to Office 2010 and now you can't find it.
Bad news is it is not easily available in Word anymore.
Good news is you have Microsoft OneNote 2010 that has even better ways to use voice recordings!
The following are a blog post instructions on how to use voice recording in OneNote and a video to demonstrate the steps. Post a comment if you have additional suggestions or questions!

1. Instructions from Microsoft's Blog
2. Video Tutorial

Digital Worksheets in MS Word - Self-paced Training

The following is an organization of resources that can give you an introduction to features in MS Word 07 that can be used to create more flexible worksheets for students.


Steps:

1. Download the following example worksheet. This is the example you will use to add the features to that are demonsrtated in the following videos. Click to open the page and then download the file to your computer: SunWorksheet.doc - click the Back Arrow to come back to this page after you download the document.




2. Choose which introductory features you would like to explore. Click on a video link below to have tasks demonstrated to you on the screen and then try for yourself on the SunWorksheet.doc worksheet. Replay videos if needed. Click the Back Arrow on your internet browser to come back to this page after you are done with each video.

• Introduction and Using Highlights


• Text to Speech Support to Read Text Aloud


• Images to Support Comprehension and Higher Level Thinking


• Hyperlinks to Create On-demand Supports


• Recorded Voice Comments for Teacher Prompts and Student Response (this feature not for schools with Windows7 or TM11 schools)


• Guide to Locating More Resources on Flexible Digital Worksheets

Some Helpful Links to Resources for MS Word and Adobe Worksheets:

Graphics, Videos and Sounds HIAT Quick Guides
MS Word HIAT Quick Guides
MS Word HIAT Help Blog Posts
Adobe Reader HIAT Quick Guide and Video on Read Aloud Feature
Adobe PDF HIAT Help Blog Posts

Delivering Password Protected Documents to Students

Are you struggling with how to deliver teacher created quizzes and assessments for students to access? One method is to: 1) make a password protected document for each class with its own unique password, 2) add the document into the appropriate folder (e.g. "McGrath" and "Period 2") on the school's "handout" folder. Provide the students that period's password and have them open the document. This can be done in Adobe PDFs (you will need to open the PDF in Adobe Professional, which is on the school network), Word docs and Kurzweil files. Click on the prior links to learn how.

Creating Accessible Worksheets from the Online Curriculum Archive

Screen demo of how to get a worksheet out of the guide on the Online Curriculum Archive and make in an accesible format as a PDF or Word

Locked Worksheets in MS Word07

Looking for a way to create a Word document for students to type directly into without reformatting your directions and questions?
To create a Word document with locked text and spaces, or form fields, for students to enter into using Word 07, see this video.

Making MS Word a Talking Word Processor - for Free!

Does your child or student benefit from using a talking word processor (speak and highlight text), talking spell check, and talking dictionary to help support their composition and self-editing? Wordtalk is a free tool that provide these support at home:
http://www.wordtalk.org.uk/Home/

For people with reading and writing difficulties, having text reinforced by hearing it read aloud can be very useful.
WordTalk is a free text-to-speech plugin developed for use with all versions of Microsoft Word (from Word 97 upwards). It will speak the text of the document and will highlight it as it goes. It contains a talking dictionary to help decide which word spelling is most appropriate.
Sitting neatly in your toolbar it is highly configurable, allowing you to:
- Adjust the highlight colors
- Change the voice and the speed of the speech
- Convert text to speech and save as a .wav or .mp3 file so that it can be played back on an iPod or mp3 player.

Another free resource to make a word processor into a talking word processor is Natural Reader - see the HIAT Quick Guides and Videos on this topic.

What other free or low cost resources have you found to provide talking word processing at home?

Coverting PDF files to Word

Have a worksheet in locked PDF format that you want students to type into?
Found a great reading passage in PDF format you want to read aloud with text reader software(e.g. Kurzweil, Natural Reader)?

In most cases, you will need to covert it to a MS Word file that can be used for these purposes.

www.zamzar.com is a free tool that allows you to upload a PDF file, have it converted to a Word document, and e-mailed back to you (usually the same day)

You can find printable quick guides and videos on text reader software and flexible features of MS Word on the HIAT web-site Quick Guides page.

What other tools do you use to convert PDF files to make them more usable?

Sharing Multimedia Files Home

Have you created some materials in Word or PowerPoint with multimedia supports (e.g. voice notes recorded in document as prompts/feedback, great images in a PowerPoint to explain a topic)?
Want students to use these documents at home?
Middle and High School staff can use Edline to post these larger files and have students or parents open them at home. Students can also use multimedia supports to respond if needed (e.g. recording their own voice notes for answers), and e-mail to the teacher (usually if under 10 MB in size) and bring to school on a portable USB drive. (see prior posts on adding voice notes for teacher prompts and student responses)

For Elementary School staff who may not have access to Edline, you can use a tool like http://www.schoolnotes.com/ to share instructional web-links and smaller files with parents and students at home. To share larger files with multimedia, you can use a file and folder sharing tool like http://www.box.net/ - a video is available to describe some ways to use this for educators.

How have you used Edline to share multimedia files with home? What has worked? What challenges have you encountered?

Save your voice! Recording prompts and directions into students’ worksheets and writing.

Recording your voice into worksheets or to provide feedback for students' writing can have benefits for those who struggle with:

• reading - permanent feedback can be provided for students who can't easily read your comments
• focus and memory - students can have on-demand directions of feedback read aloud as many times as they need them
• engagement - students often respond differently to their teacher's voice than written prompts

In order to do this, you have to add the "insert sound object" button to your tool bar.  You can use these templates to open a document with the button already positioned in the tool bar for you.

• Word 03 Voice Notes template 
• Word 07 Voice Notes template.

Here's a video on how to use them.

This strategy can also be applied to:

• Inspiration graphic organizers (Quick Guide and Video)
• PowerPoint (Quick Guide)
• Clicker5 (Quick Guide)

Have you recorded you voice to support student writing? How did it go?

Viewing two screens at the same time in Word 07
When writing an assignment in Microsoft Word it can be useful to have two windows visible at the same time, for example a screen with and outline and a working screen. This jing demonstrates how to use the "view side by side" function in Word 07. http://www.screencast.com/users/elliseit/folders/Jing/media/6e55898d-8027-413f-9ca3-8d28b49dcfc8

Using MS Word 2007 Smart Shapes to create prewriting graphic organizers

Often students need additional, customized support to help them organize their ideas prior to beginning a writing assignment.

Here's a video link that will step you through making prewriting graphic organizers using Smart Shapes in MSWord 2007.
Video


If you want a paper handout, here is a HIAT Quick Guide
QuickGuide