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New keyboard shortcuts for diacritics on LRC Teacher PC

2013/01/23 Leave a comment
  1. The US international keyboard layout that has come with MS-Windows for many years (though – except in the LRC – not set as default, you need to enable it in the control panel) greatly facilitates typing of characters for most languages that use Roman script with common diacritical marks, but does not cover Pinyin and similar diacritical marks.
  2. Carly from Carleton, as avid a language teacher as a technologist,  had the great idea to extend Microsoft’s US-international keyboard so as to include all the Pinyin tone marks (and other accents useful for linguists). Here is the upshot, extracted  from her  instructions, but excluding  what (either shortcut or (use of common accents within Pinyin is now covered also below) purpose) has not changed from the shortcuts of the non-extended US-international keyboard  that used to be the default in the LRC:
  3. What you want Which keys you press (before comma  is “dead” key = no result until after next key) Example

    acute accent, pinyin 2nd tone

    ‘(=apostrophe), vowel

    á é í ó ú

    grave accent, pinyin 4th tone

    `(=grave), vowel

    à è ì ò ù

    macron accent, pinyin 1st tone

    hyphen, vowel

    ā ē ī ō ū

    pinyin 3rd tone

    %(=shift+5), vowel

    e.g. ǎ ě ǐ ǒ ǔ

    ü with pinyin tones

    Accent, double-quote

    e.g. ǖ ǘ ǚ ǜ

    letter with dot below

    ; (=shift+period), letter

    e.g.clip_image001

    letter with double acute

    : (=shift+;) , o or u

    ő, ű, Ő, Ű
  4. We are offering the extended US-international keyboard this as an optional keyboard on the teacher and student PCs with Windows 7.
    1. To select the new keyboard layout, use the language toolbar, click on 2nd option:
    2. image
    3. To explore the new keyboard layout use the Windows On-screen keyboard which will let you peek ahead after your pressed a dead key.
    4. To bypass a special dead key (= get the normal behavior of the key), press SPACE after it.
Categories: audience-is-teachers, e-languages, English, French, German, Institution-is-University-of-North-Carolina-Charlotte, Italian, Operating-system, Polish, Portuguese, Presenter-Computer, Russian, service-is-applying-learning-tools, service-is-configuring-learning-tools, Spanish, Student-Computers, Swahili, Writing, Yoruba Tags: , , , ,

How teachers can conduct a 1-on-1 student oral assessment in their office using Sanako Lite Recorder

2013/01/22 Leave a comment
  1. If you need to conduct an OPI or other one-on-one oral exam instead of class-size oral exams we offer in the LRC,
    1. we have conducted 1-on-1 speaking assessments using the Sanako headsets and Student Recorder in the LRC.
    2. However, since this setting does not offer much privacy (and also because it blocks  the LRC classroom ), we would recommend conducting such exams in faculty offices. For this scenario, teachers can use:
      1. one of the headsets that can now be checked out by faculty, and in working condition,
      2. the Sanako LITE or standalone recorder – which could not be rolled out by IT on all teacher computers, but I programmed a workaround installer – and is friendlier (for recording and listening/grading) than Audacity. Sanako recently provided a useful guide for one-on-one examinations with the Study Lite recorder here (you do not need a desktop microphone like shown here, it is sufficient to position the headphone appropriately on the desk instead).
Categories: announcements, Arabic, assessments, audience-is-teachers, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Listening, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian, service-is-applying-learning-tools, Spanish, Speaking Tags: ,

How to record and submit a photo presentation assignment

2013/01/22 Leave a comment

A step-by-step explanation how Moodle/PowerPoint allow

  1. a student
    1. to create a photo album from their photos (remind them that they need to be able to download their photos onto the LRC computers), we will load this from their computers analogous to this: How to create a visual cue exam file using Insert Photo album in PowerPoint
    2. to narrate the photoalbum
      1. In the LRC with 2007: https://thomasplagwitz.com/2013/01/22/how-students-can-record-their-picture-or-photo-presentations-with-powerpoint-2007/
      2. or if they use 2010 outside of the LRC, https://thomasplagwitz.com/2013/01/17/recording-student-picture-presentations-with-powerpoint/
    3. To refine their presentation:
      1. Do not edit your audio – not  good language learning  pedagogy.
      2. Rather redo your entire presentation, paying extra attention to the weaknesses you observed when reflecting on your last recorded attempt . You will learn more foreign language this way than if you learn how to edit digital audio. Before you re-record your narration, clear the existing narration from PowerPoint, or save into a new file to be able to compare the Before/After.
    4. to submit: How a student takes a Moodle Single file upload assignment.
  2. a teacher
    1. to prepare:How a teacher creates a Moodle Single file upload assignment, with optional attached file
    2. to grade (reviewHow a teacher grades a Moodle Single file upload assignment):
      1. Save the Moodle file submission assignment
      2. Double-click the PPSX  file to play the file in PowerPoint.
      3. Use the Moodle grade book to grade and provide other feedback.
Categories: Arabic, assignments, audience-is-students, audience-is-teachers, documentation, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, office-software, Polish, Portuguese, recording-software, Russian, service-is-applying-learning-tools, Spanish, Speaking, step-by-step-guides, Swahili, Yoruba Tags: , , , , ,

How to install the Sanako Lite Recorder without it auto-starting and auto-restarting

2013/01/17 Leave a comment
  1. Problem:
    1. For a personal installation, but especially for a faculty-wide deploy, the default installation of the Sanako Lite Recorder seems to have too much of a footprint: Sanako Lite Recorder not only auto-starts (see e.g. the student icon in the notification area) with Windows, but also auto-restarts when exited –
    2. a useful feature of the classroom recorder from which the standalone recorder is derived, but not so much for a standalone recorder rollout. The feature is achieved by installing a  service (helper.exe) that itself is during installation set to SERVICE_AUTO_START (0x00000002).
    3. This  architecture also makes the installation option to “associate media files” with the Sanako Lite Recorder too greedy, even though it could be useful during the actual work of faculty with the Recorder.
  2. Workaround (for either manual reconfiguration after the install or to be integrated into the automated deployment):
    1. Can one set the underlying helper.exe service that gets installed during the Sanako Lite install to SERVICE_DEMAND_START (0x00000003)? Not tested. At best, this would help between computer restarts, but not when a teacher is done with editing the study recorder and tries to exit it (helper.exe, if itself started, will restarts the student.exe).
    2. Can one entirely disable  this helper.exe service  from services.msc, will the recorder still start? Testing with starting the student.exe and playing audio files did work. So one should try also during a deploy, use value SERVICE_DISABLED (0x00000004) for keys HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Sanako Helper\Start (and, in case something goes wrong later: HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\Sanako Helper\Start).
Categories: digital-audio-lab, service-is-configuring-learning-tools Tags: ,

What is “Content location” in Sanako Study Student Recorder (including Lite) for?

2013/01/17 Leave a comment

imageimage

  1. While working on rolling out the free Sanako Light recorder to all faculty computers in a more systematic, automated way, the question has come up:
  2. What is “Content location” in Sanako Study Student Recorder (Ver 6, including Lite) “Administrative Settings” for, and how can it accept a URL?
    1. No such field in Ver 5.51; no mention in the help file; no manual this new (free) version would help seems included with the download.
    2. I am trying to point the “My files” to a more shared and LRC-accessible location on our SANAKO network share. Should I try the same with “Content Location”, or is this (defaults to “Application Data”) a strictly temporary location for during authoring?
  3. Answer: Sanako seems to be planning using this for distributing their own learning materials, esp. for ESL.
Categories: audience-is-IT-staff, digital-audio-lab, service-is-configuring-learning-tools Tags: ,

How students can record their picture or photo presentations with PowerPoint 2010

2013/01/17 Leave a comment
  1. The screencast shows the necessary steps:
    1. inserting a photo album,
    2. presenting while recording the presentation with narration
    3. saving as a show (.ppsx) – make sure you have ribbon:”Slide show”/ “Play narrations” checked: image
  2. to prepare an assignment for a Moodle single-file-upload (How a student takes a Moodle Simple file upload assignment).
Categories: Arabic, assignments, audience-is-students, documentation, e-languages, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Mandarin, multimedia-recording, office-software, Polish, Portuguese, recording-software, Russian, Screencasts, service-is-applying-learning-tools, Spanish, Speaking, Swahili, Yoruba Tags: , ,

A comparison of options for student oral photo presentation assignment

2013/01/15 Leave a comment
  1. Objective: Student presents personal photos in target language (e.g. home). b
  2. Contenders for Tools:
    1. Voicethread (free version)
    2. University-environment
      1. For Multimedia authoring:
        1. MS-PowerPoint
        2. not yet contenders
          1. MS-Community Clips (screen capture recording, to be installed)
            1. benefit: single purpose, record yourself talking while flipping through the images on your computer
            2. cost: new tool to learn, and no long term perspective
          2. Sanako Student Recorder: not a contender, it has subtitling options, but cannot author multimedia presentations (teachers used to with the Sanako authoring tool, but this is not longer supported).
      2. As LMS: Moodle.
  3. Comparison:
    1. Student
      1. Authoring:
        1. (PowerPoint ties:) Image upload is easy in Voicethread (including batches): image, but PowerPoints Insert / Photo album is as fast (if you have digital photos).
        2. Image narration:

      2. Assignment submission: Voicethread (free) has no support for assignments, only for sharing. Students have to find a way to submit their Voicethread,

        1. either by email or invitation to pre-created contacts: image
        2. or, – with higher initial setup cost, but greater reusability benefit – by invitation to a pre-created contact: image, imageimage
      3. Sharing/peer-editing/grading:
        1. (Moodle would win where it has peer-grading options. YMMV:) Sharing within the class is possible, but sharing with "anyone" is a privacy (possibly FERPA) issue, and sharing with a handmade class list  (no import) is tedious.
    2. Teacher: grading
      1. Managing submissions
        1. (LMS wins?:) Voicethread (free) does not allow an export that could be uploaded to the LMS. imageStudent can email links or invitations like these:  image. It is up to you managing them, and completion of assignment and grading for the class. This is no LMS gradebook.
        2. (Voicethread wins:) PowerPoint can be saved as a slideshow that starts on click (save as .ppsx) (including with narration). But opening and listening, without the need for saving to a local file,  remains easier in Voicethread.
      2. (Voicethread wins:) Providing feedback is possible,image including oral image– but is this insert recording? And providing editing access is not the default: image
      3. Record-keeping:
        1. (Moodle wins:) Voicethread: Uh.. oh..?! I see no retention story, especially not in the free version. With Moodle, you can leave all that to the institutional support.
    3. Student: receiving feedback
      1. (A tie:) Voicethread’s audio feedback versus Moodle/PowerPoints gradebook access.
    4. Learning curve:
    5. Voicethread has the advantage of being a specialized tool (relatively few options, still relatively simple interface – few distractions).
    6. Other tools have the advantage of greater familiarity in the long run and reusability. Of course it depends also where you are working: stable positions get greater benefit from embarking on the institutional environment.

  4. Summary: PowerPoint/Moodle remains the solution for the pedagogical task at hand that the LRC currently supports. Fortunately

    1. a narration of a picture presentation using PowerPoint and
    2. its submission by the student and grading by the teacher on the basis of a  Moodle single file upload assignment are not too difficult.
Categories: audience-is-teachers, e-languages, multimedia-recording, office-software, recording-software, reviews, service-is-evaluating-learning-tools, Speaking Tags: , , ,

How teachers can record audio materials here

2013/01/10 Leave a comment

The purpose of doing a recording of learning materials for the SANAKO during a faculty workshop is merely to get you started. The use of the SANAKO is not limited to the LRC. After taking the workshop, you can:

  1. if needed,
    1. check out one of the LRC faculty headphones (we have now 5 for faculty use in our list of LRC resources),
    2. install the Sanako standalone recorder on your office or home PC,
  2. start the recorder and press the red record button,
  3. read your questions into the headset microphone, preferably after you have put them in the format of my exam template  (consider this sample exam recording a model),
  4.  use something like a bell, whistle (or simply clap your hands) to create audible cues for when you want to start/stop speaking cues
  5.  watch the timer on the Student Recorder to leave the same amount of response time for the students as you announced after the questions
  6. save the file to the proper location that I listed here: https://thomasplagwitz.com/2012/11/06/how-teachers-find-their-sanako-materials/ .

    That’s all. If you need a refresher, please come to one of my bi-weekly LRC “Sanako Clinics” that will appear in the LRC hours&events calendar.

Categories: audience-is-teachers, clinics, digital-audio-lab, documentation, e-languages, Institution-is-University-of-North-Carolina-Charlotte, service-is-learning-materials-creation Tags: