Archive
How students can record their picture or photo presentations with PowerPoint 2010
- The screencast shows the necessary steps:
- inserting a photo album,
- presenting while recording the presentation with narration
- saving as a show (.ppsx) – make sure you have ribbon:”Slide show”/ “Play narrations” checked:
- to prepare an assignment for a Moodle single-file-upload (How a student takes a Moodle Simple file upload assignment).
Pictolang, another flashcard site for vocabulary learning
- Distinguishing mark: Pictolang is based on the Culturally authentic Picture Lexicon. Here is an overview of the currently available languages and imagery:
-
Language Region # Images German 2631 Mandarin China 2336 ESL North America 2074 Russian 1420 French France 1231 Spanish Southern Cone 1022 Spanish Mexico 1000 Spanish Central America & Caribbean 872 Spanish Peninsular 579 Arabic 287 Special Collections 151 Ukrainian 139 Japanese 106 French Canada 47 Arabic Oman 11 - You can focus vocabulary your study on specific topics, which will likely integrate it better with your core textbook material (often divided into topical chapters).
- Suitable for self-study, the use of CAPL makes this an especially interesting tool for preparing work/study/travel abroad. It also allows for playing a classroom flashcard game in language culture and area studies, where the teacher can provide context and background information in the images from the target culture.
- Example o the Word Match Game right answer feedback:
- Wrong answer feedback:
Ipatrainer.com community provides free phonetic transcription tables with sounds and exercises
- This is looking good, but …
- There seem to be some coding issues, I am getting server errors 500 after registering.
- The site is advertisement-based.
- There is no content beyond the IPA sound which would put these bare basics in phonetics into language learning context and practice.
- Site Contains:
- tables for teaching your language – complete with phonetic symbols and sound samples
- and exercises for your students (e.g. Memory games, Identifying characters
, places, 
and sounds.
- tables for teaching your language – complete with phonetic symbols and sound samples
- You can
- Create your own, after free registration,
- or assign one of the ones from many other teachers.
- Most popular ones are listed here: http://www.ipatrainer.com/user/site/?language=, and if the use numbers are accurate, there must be really some serious IPA learning going on here…
- I see no way to browse other tables without having the username of the teacher who created and assigned it.
- There is also a phonetic writer.
- And a user forum, in its infancy.
Problems with accented characters in Respondus Lockdown Browser
Update: Just click on the menu item “ A” under Respondus titlebar window to bring the floating accents window back. 
Problem is only: this menu disappears now also. Anyhow: using below keyboard shortcuts is faster, and MS FixIT can now enable it for you on your home or office PC also.
Respondus Lockdown browser limits the use of modifier keys (e.g. on Windows CTRL, ALT). This prevents the use of certain traditional keyboard shortcuts for entering foreign language accented characters – including the method from times yore: ALT+number code.
Respondus Lockdown browser can work with a floating toolbar for accented characters. Unfortunately, reports are in that the floating toolbar disappears (may be related to a recent Respondus upgrade?).
Fortunately, Windows US-international keyboard – the default in the LRC – is not as much hampered by Respondus – except in t he few cases where US-international keyboard also relies on ALT- and CTRL-modifier: consult this table.
|
Press (, then release) |
then press |
Example Result |
|
` (accent grave) |
any letter that can have this accent, e.g. “a”, also cedilla ç |
à |
|
‘ (apostrophe) |
á |
|
|
^ (caret)- |
â |
Character Input Methods for SLA (Western)
For studying (typing) Western Languages (= need for diacritics only; whether you have a US keyboard hardware or UK which is pretty similar), we recommend the MS Windows US International Keyboard layout which is based on “dead keys”.
Currently installed in the LLC are the Language Bar (floating on top of screen or accessible from the taskbar) with these keyboard layouts:
Keyboard layout settings are application/window specific, and “US” (non-international) is still the default for new applications/windows, so prepare to switch after you start a new application;
There are keyboard shortcuts for switching, however, “Key settings”: “switch between input languages” , using LEFT ALT + SHIFT, does not work. Workaround: use the language bar for switching:
Windows keyboard layout settings can be temperamental – if you find you cannot switch to a certain layout anymore, you may have to restart the computer.
Use the following keyboard shortcuts to enter diacritics more easily:
|
Press (together, then release) |
then press |
Example Result |
|
` (accent grave) |
any letter that can have this accent, e.g. "a”, also cedilla ç |
à |
|
‘ (apostrophe) |
á |
|
|
^ (caret)- |
â |
|
|
~ (tilde) |
ã |
|
|
” (double quotation marks) |
ä |
|
|
CTRL+& |
Z or z |
æ |
|
rightALT+ |
X or x |
œ |
|
rightAlt+n |
|
ñ |
|
ALT+CTRL+? |
|
¿ |
|
rightAlt+? |
|
|
|
ALT+CTRL+! |
|
¡ |
|
rightAlt+1 |
|
|
|
rightAlt+s |
S |
ß |
To access the original, now dead keys, press space bar after pressing the dead key.
|
Modifiers(blue)/Layout |
Note the new modifier = “dead” keys, indicated by light blue color (click to enlarge) |
|
Normal |
|
|
|
|
|
Shift |
|
|
|
US International |
|
|
|
Screencast of US International in action here: deadkeys.wmv
Interactive Demo of installation procedure (personal computers outside of the LLC) here: keyboard_usinternational.swf
Planned improvements:
- Use LEFT ALT+Shift to switch to (Software) “Keyboard Layout” “United-States International”.
- Use other keyboard short cuts to access a desired keyboard layout directly
- Dock the “Language Bar” in the Taskbar, then hover over it to make sure you selected the proper “Keyboard Layout”.
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Other ways to find help
If you cannot find it here, look there: 5,500 Language-Learning Links and Programs for learning or teaching 150 languages
Shortcuts:Our Lists, Our Maps, LRC Staff Moodle Site,LRC Project Moodle Site, 49erexpress, UNCC Moodle, Student Recordings: s:claslcslrcsanakostudent
Learning usage samples: Sanako oral exam, Kaltura webcam presentation, Dictation with speech recognition, Sanako written exam, Chinese and Japanese interactive stroke-order practice
Test the Sanako Installer, Webbrowser Popup Konfigurator for XP, or Windows7, faster LRC TeacherPC Log-in Let MS facilitate diacritics writing by installing for you US-International keyboard layout
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