Author: Ashley Chaney

Lights, Camera, Action: Voki Drama Lesson Plans Are on Deck

Lights, Camera, Action: Voki Drama Lesson Plans Are on Deck

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Students who “act up” in class usually go to the principal’s office. However, students who act up in class using the latest Voki Drama Lesson Plans will learn, have fun, and become more attuned to the subtleties of dramatic character. Using various interactive exercises, and Voki, students will get the chance to discover their inner star and build confidence along the way.

Below are the Drama Class Lesson Plans, which are now live in the Voki Lesson Plan Database. As always, Voki lesson plans are provided to teachers for Free! 3,2,1, ACTION!

Reminder: The grade assigned to each lesson plan is not set in stone – you can use Voki lesson plans from a higher, or lower, grade than the one you teach – if you think they fit!

Tip 1: Don’t be afraid to modify Voki lesson plans to fit your students and their abilities, or your requirements & ideas.

Tip 2: Take a look at the example Voki that is provided within each lesson plan.

  1. Everyday Items, Imaginary Uses (7th grade): In this improvisational exercise, students will use their imaginations to create new ideas out of everyday objects. Students will take turns passing around an object and coming up with its new name and new use. By constricting the amount of time each student has to re-invent an old item, students must use their gut instinct which in turn will help them develop as young actors and thespians.
  2. Drama in Motion (8th grade): In this lesson, students create a play using motion and nothing else. After the play has been completed, each student creates an interpretative Voki that tells the story in words. This exercise allows students to create a theatrical piece using non-verbal forms of expression and interpretation.
  3. Dramatic Feeling Charades (9th grade): Students explore the different facets of expressing emotion through an impromptu and rigorous acting exercise. Students will get the chance to perform in front of their peers and get constructive feedback. Through this exercise, students will learn about the subtleties of emotions.
  4. From Paper to Stage (10th grade): Students read a short play and are in charge of the creative direction. Students create a Voki that describes what elements should be added to the play to make it come alive. Once students make their proposition, the class votes on which play they would like to carry out as a class for an end-of-year performance.

Each lesson plan contains the intended grade level and subject(s), the time recommended for completion, resources needed, as well as a list of objectives and activities. Voki lessons are easy to follow and can be adapted according to your own personal teaching style.

As always, we are interested in hearing about how you have used Voki in class. If you have a lesson plan that uses Voki (or that can be adapted to incorporate Voki) and you would like to share, please email us at lessonplans@voki.com.

Now go out there and break a leg!

The Voki Team

The Voki Classroom User Guide

The Voki Classroom User Guide

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 1 Comment

If you are a Voki Classroom user, you might want some help getting started. Depending on how much detail you want, you should take a look at the Voki Classroom Getting Started Guide, or the complete User Guide. This post is about some of the things you can learn in the User Guide.

If you have a question about Voki Classroom, the Voki Classroom User Guide probably has the answer! Chock full of step-by-step instruction and interesting tidbits, we have composed an easy to follow guide that will ensure a fun and successful Voki Classroom experience for teachers and students. Divided into three parts, the Voki Classroom User Guide takes you on a tour from initial set-up to reviewing and embedding your students’ Vokis.

Part I

What is Voki Classroom? Why should teachers use it? What are the benefits to using Voki Classroom? How is it organized?All of the questions above are answered in Part I, accompanied by visuals and information to help distinguish the difference between our free Voki service and Voki Classroom.

The Voki Classroom hierarchy is an important concept for every teacher to be familiar with as it is the key to understanding how data is organized and how it can be utilized efficiently. The classroom hierarchy serves as a useful visual that can help you understand the role of Voki Classroom for the teacher and the students. Once you understand how Voki Classroom is structured, the other elements become even easier to follow!

Part II

Next up is everything you need to know about getting started with Voki Classroom. Here, you will learn about the interface, as well as how to use some of the available tools to make logging in quick and easy.

Ultimately you, the teacher, are in charge of the information displayed in your account. Personal settings can be edited as you see fit and editing is a cinch! In this section you will also learn about Voki Classroom support and feedback.

As a Voki Classroom user, you are able to get unlimited e-mail support from our dedicated Support team (only available to Voki Classroom users). By taking advantage of the support tab in Voki Classroom, you won’t have to wait to get the answers you need. One of our support representatives will get back to you promptly with an answer!

Part III

Last but not least, our guide takes you through the process of putting Voki Classroom to use! Adding and editing students and their logins, creating and editing classes, and embedding and reviewing Vokis are all covered in Part III.

Here you will learn how to enter in your students’ information individually or by importing a list. Once you have added your students, you can assign them to the classes you created. The guide will show you how to do all this, as well as other tricks, such as making an Assignment “hidden” (making it invisible to the student until it is time to complete the assignments).

One of the advantages of using Voki Classroom is that you are no longer required to embed student Vokis onto a separate webpage. Voki Classroom provides a configurable Web page for each Assignment , and student Vokis are displayed automatically!

Voki Classroom is easy and fun but if you have any questions, keep in mind that you have the Voki Classroom User Guide and unlimited e-mail  support to help you out.

To view the Voki Classroom User Guide, visit Voki.com and click on the “Learn” tab. There, you will find the User Guide among many other useful tools to help you get the most out of your Voki experience.

Thank you for your support and on behalf of the entire Voki Team, we wish you a happy school year!

Tip of the Week – Viewing Voki in Full Screen

Tip of the Week – Viewing Voki in Full Screen

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 1 Comment

Can you make a Voki scene appear in FULL SCREEN?

Yes, you can!

If you’ve ever wanted to view a Voki in full-screen mode, there is a really neat trick we’d like to share with you. This can be useful for presentations, for those who are visually impaired, and just as a cool trick that you can teach others.

Follow the steps below to make your Voki full screen!

Note: The code may look overwhelming but if you follow these steps, playing your Voki in full screen will be a breeze.

  1. In My Voki, click on the Voki you want to display.
  2. Click the ‘Publish’ button.
  3. Copy the embed code and Paste into any word processing document.
Now, here’s the fun challenge… You need to be a little bit of a sleuth and pick out the right part of the code:
Tip: This is a great student exercise in attention to detail.
  1. A few lines from the bottom of the code, you should see a URL  (http://) in quotes
  2. Copy the URL beginning with: http://vhss-d.oddcast.com/vhss_editors/voki_player.swf?doc= (do not include the quotation marks) and ending with a number before the word “quality”
  3. Paste the URL into your browser and click Go
That’s it! If you copied the URL correctly, your Voki will now load in Full Screen mode.
Here is an example. You want to copy the highlighted part.

Voila!

Now, you’ll have the biggest Voki of them all!

What do you think? Share your comments below and we’ll be sure to respond.

Until next time,

The Voki Team

Rediscovering America: Columbus Day Lesson Plans

Rediscovering America: Columbus Day Lesson Plans

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 3 Comments

The ways in which we have celebrated Columbus Day have varied greatly throughout American history. Some use this day to honor Italian-American immigrant ancestors and others observe the achievements that have been made in America since it became a place on the map. On the other hand, many people don’t think about anything at all! Today’s Columbus Day celebrations, like the man himself and the stories that followed his ‘discoveries’, are wide-ranging.

Although we can’t tell you what to do or think (or celebrate) on Columbus Day, we are here to help you plan your class with ease! So, let’s make this Columbus Day a day of rediscovery. With a fresh new batch of lesson plans, we aim to break down some myths that surround American history and rediscover these same histories with a different and more inquisitive lens, using Voki of course!

Below are the Voki Columbus Day Lesson Plans, which are now live in the Voki Lesson Plan Database!

(Remember – the grade assigned to each lesson plan is our best guess – you can use Voki lesson plans from a higher, or lower, grade than the one you teach – if you think they fit!)

  1. Who was Christopher Columbus? (5th grade): Columbus and his voyages are investigated using primary sources and critical thinking.
  2. Discovering America (4th grade): Who did the Europeans encounter when they landed in America?
  3. Deconstructing the American Revolution (7th grade): Students learn about the policies that led to the American Revolution and analyse their effects on a society on the brink of chaos.
  4. America: Before and After the Industrial Revolution (10th grade): Students learn about how American industry became more efficient and modernized after an industrial invention boom.

Rethinking what are often considered to be facts is a great exercise for students. By questioning history, students will discover for themselves that this subject is one that has been passed down from human to human through many different perspectives. By combining primary sources with critical thinking, these lessons bring history to life and show students that various stories make up each historical event or period.

Along with helping students analyze the murkier parts of history, the lessons will help students discover new ‘facts’ for themselves, which is a valuable tool for developing thought processes and is essentially related to Christopher Columbus!

Each lesson contains the intended grade level and subject(s), the time recommended for completion, resources needed, as well as a list of objectives and activities. The lessons are easy to follow and can be adapted according to your own personal teaching style.

As always, we are interested in hearing about how you have used Voki in class. If you have a lesson plan that uses Voki and you would like to share, please email us at lessonplans@voki.com.

Happy Columbus Day and have fun rediscovering America!

Lesson Plan Preview – Conjugation Practice with Voki

Lesson Plan Preview – Conjugation Practice with Voki

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 5 Comments

Learning a second language can be tough for all ages. Making grammar practice fun can be just plain difficult. Here at Voki, we have been working on creating lesson plans that can bring seemingly mundane subjects to life and make learning fun!

One lesson in particular is focused on making grammar and conjugation more engaging – more than just written repetition and paperwork. By using Voki to practice conjugation and sentence structure, students will get the chance to interact with language through sight and sound.

The lesson plan “Conjugation and Sentence Practice with Voki” calls for students to choose a verb, conjugate in the tense being studied, and create a Voki. Following the conjugations, students type an example sentence. The Voki can then pronounce their conjugations and example sentence in the language being studied and in the preferred dialect. Once students feel comfortable with the pronunciation and conjugations of a verb, they can record their own voice for the Voki.

If the teacher uses Voki Classroom, a webpage is automatically created for the lesson. If the lesson is conducted using Voki (and not Voki Classroom), the teacher can use a class blog or webpage to display the Vokis. By creating a webpage, teachers and students have access to an online audio-visual database of verbs that are fully conjugated and pronounced correctly. The webpage can serve as reference and extra practice for the class.

“Conjugation and Sentence Practice with Voki” is one of many new lesson plans that we have added to the Voki Lesson Plan Database. As always, Voki lesson plans are free for all to peruse and use. Happy conjugating!

The Voki Team

New Lesson Plans for the New School Year

New Lesson Plans for the New School Year

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 2 Comments

School has already begun and we are sure you have a lot on your to-do list. Here at Voki, we are working hard to help you prepare for the new school year on the technology front! We have added many new lesson plans that do not take long to complete, and don’t require much prep time. These are great for re-introducing your students to Voki and to your subject (in case they forgot anything over the summer…it happens).

The new lesson plans cover a variety of topics and span from kindergarten to 12th grade. Below are several examples of new lesson plans, now available in Voki’s Lesson Plan Database:

  • Discovering Your Intelligence: Students create a Voki to elaborate and speak about their favorite hobby.
  • Classroom Topic of the Week: Students follow a current event and create a Voki presentation. Perfect for Social Studies!
  • The Meaning of a Poem: Students analyze a poem by using their intuition and personal opinions. This allows them to feel more engaged with poetry and more confident with literary analysis.
  • Guess Who with Voki: A fun game of guess who? with historical figures will keep students entertained and informed.
  • Elicited Opinions of History: Students form concise arguments based off of their opinions of the current topic or debate in class.

Each lesson contains the intended grade level and subject(s), the time recommended for completion, resources needed, as well as a list of objectives and activities. Each lesson is easy to follow and can be adapted according to your own personal teaching style.

Remember, Voki lesson plans are completely free – and are our way of thanking you for using Voki for education.

As always, we are interested in hearing about the Voki lessons you have used in class. If you have a lesson plan that uses Voki and you would like to share, please email us at lessonplans@voki.com.

Happy teaching!

The Voki Team

Technology: It exists. Make it come alive!

Technology: It exists. Make it come alive!

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 3 Comments

At its most basic level, technology is the advancement of knowledge through the use of new tools, trades, and methods. This in mind, we can say that technology is not, and has never been, a new concept to society, or to school districts. Here’s a short video to illustrate the point:

Before we had ball point pens, we had fountain pens and before we had wood based paper, we had the costly and elusive rag-based paper made from textiles and linens. Today, we have paper, pens, desktops, laptops, smart phones, touch pads and much more. It is now time we maximize each item’s potential as our predecessors did when paper was no longer an item of the elite, but could be used by everyone.

The speed at which new educational tools are introduced is staggering, and it can be overwhelming for educators to think about maintaining an up-to-date classroom on top of everything else. For this reason, we have created Voki Classroom. Serving as a platform for teachers to manage all of their students’ Voki assignments, Voki Classroom makes integrating technology and education a breeze. To make things even easier, we have also been adding lesson plans created with Voki Classroom in mind. We’ll continue adding new lessons, for both Voki and Voki Classroom, throughout the year.

Keeping up with the technological Joneses may seem daunting but Voki Classroom, along with other online tools, exists to make the transition very smooth. If you are interested in Voki Classroom, you can get all the info – such as features, pricing, and so on – at www.voki.com.

Also, check out these links below for technology tips for teachers:

Ten Tips by Jose Picardo

Ronn Waters, Technology Proponent

Until next time!

The Voki Team

Interviews with Educators | Mrs. Menezez

Interviews with Educators | Mrs. Menezez

by Ashley Chaney ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Ana Maria Menezez is an English teacher in Brazil and uses Voki to inspire her students to speak up and learn a foreign language in an engaging atmosphere. Ana was kind enough to share with us some examples of how she uses Voki in the classroom along with some of her own tips and tricks.

Ana uses Voki to motivate students to practice speaking in a personalized way and also creates her own Voki to improve interaction between teacher and student. One of the most important things about Voki for Ana is its ability to help the quieter students speak up and have a voice in class.

For more of Ana’s tips, tricks, and Voki experiences, check out the interview below!

Check out Ana’s blog: Life Feast

Follow Ana on Twitter: @anamariacult

Want to be interviewed for the Voki blog?
Send us an email at submit@voki.com and we’ll get in touch!