Step 1: Script and Audio
This step is done in advance of student workday. The teacher creates short scripts that are based on a standard, and the teacher records his/her voice while reading them. Each short script and matching audio file will be given to a student group, and every student group should receive a different one. The audio is stored in a location that students can obtain (suggested: Google Drive, dropbox, flash drive), but the script needs to be given to students as a hard copy. By having the teacher complete this step, it can maximize time and ensure strong, standards based content. However, students will still have many opportunities to be creative in future steps!
1. Create a printed script.
Decide on scripts that you will give groups to illustrate their storyboard on. Try to make your script short, standards based, and as engaging as possible. At our presentations, we show some examples. Consider having short scripts of only 4-6 sentences, which is about 30 seconds of speaking. Why? If you have 7 groups, and they all receive a different script, this is still about 3 1/2 minutes of audio. This will be short enough for you to be able to record your voice narrating the script, but it still can address major points of a standard.
2. Identify different methods that you can use to record your voice.
Technology Resources: Many laptops have internal microphones. You may just need to do some searching for where the microphone is located on the laptop (google the manufacturer name) and which recording program can be used with it (which may be built in). Another great option is your smartphone or tablet! A voice recorder is built into a lot of smartphones and tablets (it is called “Voice Memos” for iPhone/iPad or “Voice Recorder” for many android devices).
Do You Need to Edit Audio?: If scripts are short, you do not have much audio to read. That also means that you do not need to edit your audio, and you can skip editing all together! Editing audio takes time and is only recommended if you are doing long recordings.
If You Choose to Edit Audio: With our videos, we tend to have 6-8 minutes of audio for one video. This means that we do have to edit our audio in most cases, because chances are likely that we will make mistakes in that long of a recording, and it takes too long to redo the whole recording. We use the program Audacity (Windows only) for editing. Quicktime is ideal for Apple. There are many apps for tablets and smartphones that will let you edit audio. You can see a listing if you search for "edit voice" in your app store. We are continuing to research our favorites that we mention in our presentations.
Storing Audio for Easy Downloading: If the audio is stored on a cloud such as Google Drive, it will be easy for your student groups to download. Students will not need to listen to it yet since they will have the scripts that match it completely. If you do not have access to a cloud such as Google Drive, try a flashdrive that can be shared among the group.
What if students additionally want music for their creation? You can find information about any music we use in individual video details. Here are some options for student projects! Be sure to read their terms of use and information about how music needs to be credited.
YouTube Audio Library
The YouTube Audio Library has a great bank of songs that are free to use. You can click on each piece of music to see whether they need credit or not (as well as how to do it correctly). Also, it includes a bank of sound effects!
Creative Commons Music
Check out all the information here!
OC Remix
Overclocked Remix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation and promotion of video game music as an art form. We actually used an OC Remix song in a few of our very first videos. You can see the credit we have placed in the "details" for those first set of videos that contain it.
1. Create a printed script.
Decide on scripts that you will give groups to illustrate their storyboard on. Try to make your script short, standards based, and as engaging as possible. At our presentations, we show some examples. Consider having short scripts of only 4-6 sentences, which is about 30 seconds of speaking. Why? If you have 7 groups, and they all receive a different script, this is still about 3 1/2 minutes of audio. This will be short enough for you to be able to record your voice narrating the script, but it still can address major points of a standard.
2. Identify different methods that you can use to record your voice.
Technology Resources: Many laptops have internal microphones. You may just need to do some searching for where the microphone is located on the laptop (google the manufacturer name) and which recording program can be used with it (which may be built in). Another great option is your smartphone or tablet! A voice recorder is built into a lot of smartphones and tablets (it is called “Voice Memos” for iPhone/iPad or “Voice Recorder” for many android devices).
Do You Need to Edit Audio?: If scripts are short, you do not have much audio to read. That also means that you do not need to edit your audio, and you can skip editing all together! Editing audio takes time and is only recommended if you are doing long recordings.
If You Choose to Edit Audio: With our videos, we tend to have 6-8 minutes of audio for one video. This means that we do have to edit our audio in most cases, because chances are likely that we will make mistakes in that long of a recording, and it takes too long to redo the whole recording. We use the program Audacity (Windows only) for editing. Quicktime is ideal for Apple. There are many apps for tablets and smartphones that will let you edit audio. You can see a listing if you search for "edit voice" in your app store. We are continuing to research our favorites that we mention in our presentations.
Storing Audio for Easy Downloading: If the audio is stored on a cloud such as Google Drive, it will be easy for your student groups to download. Students will not need to listen to it yet since they will have the scripts that match it completely. If you do not have access to a cloud such as Google Drive, try a flashdrive that can be shared among the group.
What if students additionally want music for their creation? You can find information about any music we use in individual video details. Here are some options for student projects! Be sure to read their terms of use and information about how music needs to be credited.
YouTube Audio Library
The YouTube Audio Library has a great bank of songs that are free to use. You can click on each piece of music to see whether they need credit or not (as well as how to do it correctly). Also, it includes a bank of sound effects!
Creative Commons Music
Check out all the information here!
OC Remix
Overclocked Remix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation and promotion of video game music as an art form. We actually used an OC Remix song in a few of our very first videos. You can see the credit we have placed in the "details" for those first set of videos that contain it.
