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Example 5: Watch how you can dictate to Windows speech-recognition (e.g. in English) and correct results in MS-Word

2014/03/07 Leave a comment

  1. Important: Listen carefully: I am not a native speaker, but have a reasonably low amount of errors, because it enunciate, speak clearly and slowly, and separate the words.
  2. Consider it part of the exercise that you will have to re-read and re-type some your output – use track changes in MS-Word:
    1. Make it a game: How good can you get?
    2. If you get really good at it, make a screencast like this one and include it in your Mahara ePortfolio  as authentic evidence of your foreign language proficiency.
  3. Overall, it’s like how I refer to cycling: Beats walking. Anytime. Smiley
Categories: assignments, audience-is-students, audience-is-teachers, e-languages, English, French, German, Hindi, Japanese, Mandarin, multimedia-recording, Operating-system, Reading, Screencasts, service-is-applying-learning-tools, Spanish, Speaking, Student-Computers, training, Writing Tags: , , ,

A first look at the Google Dictionary extension for Chrome

2014/03/06 Leave a comment
  1. We
    1. have not pre-installed in the LRC (for that the extension would need to be more manageable by the teacher during face-to-face classes, which include exams),
    2. but can (with some reservations) recommend the Google Dictionary extension (even though it is only available for Chrome). Here is why:
  2. Google dictionary extension provides an interface to Google define and translate
    1. that is convenient (as quickly accessed like glosses) for reading activities in many languages (Q: is the privileged word sense displayed here intelligently chosen?)
    2. while (for some languages more than for others) providing access to additional word senses, usage examples and historical background information
  3. Interface 1: Tooltip,
    1. for English with audio image
    2. for other languages without audio (even though audio pronunciation may be available in Google translate for that language): image
    3. convenient access (I have been loving the tooltip interface since Google toolbar days)
    4. limited, but useful  information,
      1. a word sense – not that this is still not contextually intelligent (Cannot blame them here!) and hence more than one word sense should be offered (here I must blame them: Boo!!): E.g.  here “arch” should at show more than the most common word sense: imageimage
      2. including pronunciation (not IPA, but audio)
    5. Interface 2 (“more”)
      1. For English, a click on “more” leads to the Google “define”search operator (the related etymology search operator has been reviewed here before): image
      2. Interface 3: unfold the search results by clicking on the down arrow at the bottom to access additional information:image =
        1. additional word sense entries
        2. historical:
          1. etymology
          2. frequency data
        3. translation/dictionary entry:
          1. for our learners of languages other than English, the translation appears right in the tool tip, see above;
          2. for our ESL learners, this seems a few too many steps for accessing this information, although a monolingual dictionary is useful in many instances also.
    6. For languages other than English, a click on more leads to Google translate, which (should get its own article, but for what it is worth) can be
      1. more limiting than “define”: While you are given multiple word senses for
        1. Spanish: image
        2. and to a lesser extent, for
          1. Arabic: image
          2. Hindi: image
      2. for many languages the results are much more limiting:
        1. Even if you look up German or French, you revert back to the (pedagogically terrible) single word-sense original “translation” interface ) image
        2. For East Asian languages, you get Roman alphabet transcriptions
          1. e.g. Chinese with Pinyin: image
          2. e.g. Japanese: image
  4. Still no per-user tracking? Here it would make sense for the user.
Categories: Arabic, audience-is-students, audience-is-teachers, Dictionaries, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Mandarin, Polish, Portuguese, Reading, Russian, service-is-evaluating-learning-tools, Spanish, Swahili, websites, Yoruba Tags: , , ,

How to type phonetic symbols on a computer

2013/11/16 2 comments
  1. Web-based On-screen-keyboards (point-and-click; low learning curve, but no fast typing speed; typing into a textbox from where you can copy/paste the result into other programs):
    1. http://westonruter.github.com/ipa-chart/keyboard/: Sounds are systematically organized. Suitable for learners, but also good for teacher demonstrations. image
    2. Partially based on keyboard shortcuts: http://www.ipatrainer.com/user/site/index.php?pageID=ipawriter: image
      1. http://ipa.typeit.org/full/: Other than the English version, the full version includes non-English sounds. The interface is optimized for fast typing (sorted by keyboard key). Presumably better for teachers using a screen projector as a whiteboard. image
      2. i2speak.com (reviewed here earlier): imageimage
      3. Update: Richard Ishida’s seems also impressive,
        1. image
        2. and you can use phonetics terminology to get characters selected, like so: image
  2. Windows-based:
    1. http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/resource/phonetics/: MS-Windows keyboard layout. May be good for even faster typing, if you can memorize the keyboard layout or add keyboard stickers (we unfortunately have too many languages vying for our hardware keyboard space already). Requires download & installation (may be added to the LRC keyboards during next imaging if we receive enough requests).
    2. http://staff.washington.edu/dmontero/IPACharmap/.
    3. http://sourceforge.net/projects/allchars/: If you are use to the ALT+### method of entering characters and are still on XP, this may be for you: You can generate your own keyboard shortcuts for phonetic characters.
    4. MS-Word:
      1. http://email.eva.mpg.de/~bibiko/downloads/uniqoder/uniqoder.html: Allows to select IPA-Symbols from a toolbar. Untested.
  3. There are also always X-Sampa and CXS and ASCII-IPA: ways of writing IPA in plain ASCII messages  – but yet another thing to teach novices in phonetics may be a bridge too far.
Categories: Arabic, audience-is-students, audience-is-teachers, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, learning-materials, Mandarin, Operating-system, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, service-is-evaluating-learning-tools, Spanish, Speaking, Swahili, websites, Yoruba Tags: ,

How to create screencasts of student presentations for the language learner ePortfolio in the digital audio lab

2013/11/08 Leave a comment

image

  1. Students can now easily video-record their own screens during class presentations – not only when using PowerPoint; instead students could demo a website, like their Facebook page.
  2. Last year, we were limited to PowerPoint’s record slideshow with timing and narration feature, and either send the PPSX (small, but requires the PowerPoint viewer) or the “Save as” video (new in PowerPoint 2010; computing intensive and large file size).
  3. Now with MS-Community Clips, screencasts are
    1. minimal effort to create (keyboard shortcut WIN+ALT+R or T; save on desktop; drag/drop into Sanako homework folder)
    2. and little effort to distribute:
      1. Students could have uploaded to a Moodle’ file upload assignment (default file size limit: 64MB) or Kaltura file upload assignment (not sure whether there is a size limit). This seems more suitable for assignments with screencasts recordings.
      2. In this instance
        1. Sanako collected the Homework files to the Sanako share,
        2. my langlabemailer emailed them as attachment (so far tested to allow for 25MB attachment size, the equivalent of 7-8 minute screencast, a hefty space to fill in L2!  We also established: 45MB is too much… Smile)  to the originating student and teacher, for review, grading –
      3. and – provided it passes muster as an attractive and significant piece – possibly for re-use in the student’s language learner ePortfolio.
  4. In addition,
    1. Before the presentations, the teacher easily collaborated on proof-reading the slide decks of individual students, by using the Sanako Remote control screen sharing feature.
    2. During the presentation, students followed more closely – which seemed to increase their attention and comprehension -, thanks to audio and screen being shared to them from the presenter, using the Sanako’s  “Model student” feature.
Categories: Arabic, audience-is-teachers, digital-audio-lab, e-languages, English, eportfolio, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hindi, Italian, Japanese, learning-usage-samples, Mandarin, multimedia-recording, office-software, Portuguese, presentations, Presenter-Computer, Russian, Spanish, Speaking, Student-Computers Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

How to use NanoGong in your Moodle course as an audio file recorder

2013/10/17 Leave a comment
  1. NanoGong is primarily meant for submitting audio recordings to the teacher and fellow students.
  2. However, it can also serve as a simple audio recorder that can save a recording to a files:
    1. accessible anywhere where you have internet access (on a JAVA-capable device. I have not tested NanoGong’s compatibility with  smartphones or tablets, though) and a microphone – provided you/your teacher have added a NanoGong activity to the Moodle Course.
    2. Might be useful for collecting recordings as pieces for your language learner ePortfolios.
  3. To use NanoGong as an audio recorder: Instead of (or on top of/before) submitting your recording to the course, click the rightmost button: image:
    1. and you can save your recording to a file
    2. image_thumb[17]_thumb[1],
    3. in a variety of formats (compressed WAV is likely most compatible),
    4. including in the different speeds: image_thumb[18]_thumb that you de/increased the playback speed here: image_thumb[15]_thumb.
Categories: Arabic, audience-is-students, audience-is-teachers, documentation, English, eportfolio, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, multimedia-recording, Polish, Portuguese, recording-software, Russian, Spanish, Speaking, Swahili, Yoruba Tags: , ,

How a student can easily complete an audio recording assignment in Moodle, using the new NanoGong plugin

2013/10/17 Leave a comment
  1. Open your assignment (note the loudspeaker/dummy icon for NanoGong assignments/) from the Moodle landing page.CAM03104
  2. Unfortunately, there are a considerable number JAVA warning dialogues to bypass during NanoGong activities before you can even see the recorder plugin on the page, and may be more when you try to submit.
  3. Once you are on the NanoGong assignment page: click red button to record, image_thumb[10]
  4. Make sure the volume meter shows input when speaking (loud enough) or playing back: image_thumb[13]
  5. After recording, submit: image
  6. After submitting,
    1. You can still edit your submission, by
      1. (1) deleting your recording or
      2. re-adding – or (provided your teacher’s assignment allows for (3) multiple recordings)  just adding – (2) your recordings
      3. or adding a (4) message to the teacher
    2. you can also revisit this page to read (5) feedback the teacher gives you about your recording:CAM03108
  7. Experiencing issues? Check troubleshooting page here.
Categories: Arabic, assignments, audience-is-students, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, lms, Mandarin, multimedia-recording, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Speaking, Swahili, Yoruba Tags: ,

How a teacher can easily assign an audio recording in Moodle, using the new NanoGong plugin

2013/10/17 Leave a comment
  1. We are back in business with easy audio recording assignments in the LMS, thanks to NanoGong – the free recorder I recommended when first starting here – now being available in MOODLE (presumably with the Upgrade to Moodle 2, I almost missed that….)
  2. To assign, click “turn editing on”, “Add activity or resource”, select “NanoGong voice activity”, as pictured below: image
  3. There are a few interesting options:
    1. you can limit the duration
    2. you can limit the number of recordings (attempts?) allowed  (0 is unlimited)
    3. You can let students listen to each other recordings. (Is there a rating feature that can be combined with this?) image
    4. And this is what
      1. you will see (TBA:read on for how to listen to student submissions, give feedback and grade.)image
    5. your students will see…
Categories: Arabic, assignments, audience-is-teachers, e-languages, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek (modern), Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, lms, Mandarin, multimedia-recording, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Speaking, Swahili, Yoruba Tags: ,

Freely downloadable samples from the IPA Phonetics Handbook

2013/08/21 Leave a comment
  1. This handbook provides audio pronunciation samples (in WAV) for many different languages. While they are more useful in conjunction with the book, they also can be searched by filename (= the pronounced word in English translation).
  2. We make these file accessible in the LRC on the Sanako share (S:\COAS\LCS\LRC\media\TUTOR\phonetics\ipa-phonetics-handbook\). Here are the languages included:.
    1. American-English
    2. Amharic
    3. Arabic
    4. Bulgarian
    5. Cantonese
    6. Catalan
    7. Croatian
    8. Czech
    9. Dutch
    10. French
    11. Galician
    12. German
    13. Hausa
    14. Hebrew
    15. Hindi
    16. Hungarian
    17. Igbo
    18. Irish
    19. Japanese
    20. Korean
    21. Persian
    22. Portuguese
    23. Sindhi
    24. Slovene
    25. Swedish
    26. Thai
    27. Turkish
Categories: Arabic, e-languages, Farsi, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, learning-materials, Mandarin, Portuguese Tags: ,