I’m adding it to The Best Sources Of Advice For Making Good Presentations.

They can also be used as good speaking opportunities for English Language Learners.

I’ve written a lot about how I use online video games with ELL’s. One thing I’d like to do is have students play video games using “walkthroughs” (instructions and hints about how best to “win”) and create instructional screencast ”walkthroughs” that would teach other students how to play the game.

Of course, students could also just leave a stationary picture on the screen and talk about it.

In order to make it on this list, the application needed to be accessible to ELL’s and not require any downloading of software, since downloads are problematic for many schools.

Here are my picks for The Best Tools For Making Screencasts:

As regular readers know, my favorite is Screentoaster. It couldn’t be more simple to use, and they’ve recently added both the ability to record audio and add subtitles. All you do after you log-in is click on a button, open up the window on your screen that you want to record, and it starts recording your screen.  After that’s been recorded, you can provide audio or subtitles.  And it’s free. I’ve also placed it on The Best Sites To Practice Speaking English.

DemoGirl also has a screencast on how to use that application, but it might not include its newest features.

Screencast-O-Matic is also nice, but a bit more complicated than Screentoaster.

Two newer apps that look good are Screenr and Screenjelly.

The great site Teacher Training videos has a screencast on how to use Screenjelly.

And, though I’m limiting this list to apps that require no software download, I do feel I have to at least mention Jing, which is a very popular free tool available by download. Teacher Training Videos also has a screencast explaining how to use Jing.

If you think I’m missing any tools, or if you have other ideas on how they can be used effectively with students, feel free to leave a comment.

You might also be interested in the other nearly 350 “The Best…” lists.

And you might want to consider subscribing to this blog for free, too.

It’s definitely worth a read….

I’m adding it to The Best Sources Of Advice For Making Good Presentations.

“…slides should be processed in 3 seconds or less. It’s impossible for people to process your slides and your words simultaneously. The test gives you a quantifiable way to test a slide’s viability as a glance medium by calculating a signal-to-noise ratio for individual slides.”

This can be a very useful tool for both teachers and students to keep in mind when developing any kind of presentation slides. I’m adding it to The Best Sources Of Advice For Making Good Presentations.

It’s really quite a simple tool for use by English Language Learners or anybody else…after you watch the short demonstration video. It was confusing to me prior to watching it.

It’s easy for users to add music that’s already in the Myna library to their recording, and certainly easy for them to record their own voice.

It’s more complicated than some of the other applications on The Best Sites To Practice Speaking English, but students will love Myna (and I’m obviously adding it to that list).

Thanks to both Read Write Web and Free Technology For Teachers for the tip.

They are definitely worth a visit.

She also points to a very well-researched post in a new ESL blog by Ballard & Tighe, Publishers. The post, titled Speaking Of Writing: The Significance Of Oral Language In English Learners’ Literacy Development, is also worth a read.

The element that really makes it stand-out is the ease of use for creating and doing verbal assignments.

It’s particularly useful, it seems to me, for online classes. I don’t think I’d be interested in making time to do it for students who I see everyday. However, I could see it being a neat way for students to create assignments other students to complete.

What do you think of it?

Thanks to Peter Vogel for the tip.

Both Joyce Valenza and Alice Mercer have written extensive posts about it, so I’d encourage you to read them.

Here’s a short quote from VoiceThread’s announcement about just one of their new features:

We’re very happy to announce that over 700,000 historical images from The New York Public Library’s Digital Gallery are now freely and instantly available whenever you’re creating a VoiceThread. Our new Media Browser allows you to search or browse these primary source materials – maps, photos, drawings, paintings, posters and more, and then import them directly. Links back to the original location of the images on the web are automatically inserted to make citing and attribution easier for you and your students