Screencast It!

Screen casts lend themselves to any 'procedural' instructions for computer use in the classroom. As a language teacher whose goal is to use the target language as much as possible in during class time, this is particularly appealing. Demonstrating how to do something on the computer while using Spanish is incredibly difficult for students to follow. Even with the smartboard and a physical demonstration, it is very rare that more than half the class remembers the steps necessary to complete a task. A screen cast, however, allows students to view instructions at their own pace multiple times. This is an incalculably huge advantage.

Even without the language aspect of the Spanish classroom, I can't begin to count the number of times of times I have been pulled away from, for example, helping a student improve their writing in order to help a student upload a photo/save to the server/record audio etc. With a library of clips (time to compile one) explaining the common 'hows' on my blog, I would be able to focus on core learning.

The best part of this would be increased independence on the part of students. There are already many questions I don't answer but instead direct students to answer themselves by reading classroom text. Referring them to screen casts would be another step on the same path to independent resolution of simple problems. There is nothing so gratifying as watching a student figure out how to answer his/her own questions.

Finally, at many points in the K-12 curricula, we ask students to engage in procedural writing. Screen casting is an excellent opportunity to integrate procedural writing and technology use. Throw in a video camera and a student could do a screen cast of just about anything. The visual aspect of a screen cast would ensure that students do not leave out key steps in their explanations (something they inevitably do when they write).