Demonstrating SpeakIt, a Chrome Extension that reads text-to-speech

In this blog entry I share with you SpeakIt, a free text-to-speech online tool that is an extension that you can download from the Chrome store. To use it you need to use Chrome as your browser.

1. Using Chrome as your browser (very important!) go to the Chrome Store and search for the extension "SpeakIt" (so when you search, make sure to select the "extension" button as shown in the screenshot below).
2. Click on the "+ Free" button to install the extension icon to your Chrome browser toolbar.
   
   
3. You are then ready to go! To have SpeakIt read text to you, highlight the text that you want read aloud, and click on the SpeakIt icon that you will see on your Chrome toolbar.
   

Below is a video that I created to demonstrate how SpeakIt works:

Demonstrating TalkTyper - a free online Speech-to-Text dictation tool

I just learned about a very useful free, online text-to-speech dictation tool called TalkTyper. Dication tools are invaluable for people who cannot type, but they can also be great for those who aren't great typists, or who prefer to think out loud rather than by typing or writing. In this video below I demonstrate how to use TalkTyper:

Automatically archiving emails once you have replied to them

Here's a tip to help reduce the amount of time you spend going through your gmail inbox and manually archiving or moving emails from your inbox to folders:

1. Go to your gmail settings (you get there by selecting "settings" from the cog wheel that appears on the right hand side of your gmail inbox):
   
2. Under the "general" tab in your gmail settings, scroll down to the section on "Send and Archive." Select the option to "Show Send and Archive button in reply."
   
   
3. When you reply to an email, the blue "Send +" button will be at the bottom of the reply text box. Once you have typed your response, instead of clicking the "send" button, you can choose the "Send+" and the email to which you replied will automatically be archived in your gmail archive. This removes it from your inbox, but keeps it (in your archive) so that you can access it later should you need to refer to it. You can find it by searching for it by keyword in the email, subject line or by the email address of the sender.
   (Note: if you don't want to archive the message, then just click on "Send" rather than "Send+")
   
   

How to create and post to a blog using Weebly

This week in my Educ 2000 (Technology for Teaching and Learning) course my students are creating their first blog post using the free website and blog site Weebly. I created a short video for them to demonstrate how to create a blog, how to change the blog settings so that they moderate comments on their blog, and then how post their first blog entry. (Note: They have already set up their Weebly site, so this video starts out assuming that anyone watching it already has a Weebly site).

Although the video is geared specifically to my students, it should be helpful to anyone out there who wants to know how to set up a Weebly blog. So here you are...

Screencasting tools & tips

I find screencasting a very useful strategy when I want to demonstrate how to do something on a computer. If I record what is on my computer screen (which is what a screencast is), then my target audience (e.g. my students or you my blog readers) can watch the video, pausing it or replaying it as needed. You can also refer back to it at any time.

There are a variety of free and cross-platform tools to create a screencast. My favorite, in order of preference, are:

1. Screencast-O-Matic
2. Screencastify (Chrome store app) 
3. Jing

I created the following short screencast using Screencast-O-Matic to demonstrate what a screencast can look like, and also I use this screencast to show you the websites for the above mentioned tools.

To share your screencast:

There are different options for this, and which you use depends on your audience and privacy levels you want to retain for your video.

1. Easy and public: upload your video to YouTube (you have to have a Google Account to do this). This is what I used to share the above video. I used the embed code of the video so that I could insert (embed) the video into my blog here, but you can also just provide the link to the video.
2. Upload video to your Google Drive, and then share the link to your video (you can make the video sharing settings public, so anyone can view, or you can give access only to select groups or people). If you are teaching at a school or university and are have created a Google Group for your class, you can share the video just with your class by pasting the Google Group name in to the "share" settings. 
3. If you use a Learning Management System (like Moodle, Blackboard) you can upload the video to your course site.
4. If you use website hosting site like Weebly and use the free version, then you can include videos in your website, but cannot upload the video to your Weebly account (that comes with the paid version of Weebly). To include a video on your website, you need to upload it to YouTube or to your Google Drive and then link to it or embed it that way.

Managing your email (and surviving to tell the tale!)

This week my co-Faculty Fellow Mitra Emad and I facilitated a Just-in-Time session at UMD managing email. I know this issue of trying to keep up with our email is a HUGE problem for many of us! Mitra lead this session and put together a very helpful blog with suggestions to manage email, so rather than me blogging about this too, I'll just link you to the blog entry she wrote (which is on our UMD Teaching and Learning with Technology Blog).  Mitra includes:

•  a very helpful video in which Bruce Reeves (from UMD ITSS) describes how he manages his email
• Managing Email with Gmail" training video
• a link to 6 Tips for Managing your Gmail, and Retaining your Sanity. This gives step-by-step directions (with screen shots) on what to do. Very well worth checking out!

Advising Resources for UMD advisors

Just a quick post to suggest that advisors contact their advisees at the start of the semester to welcome them back, let them know your office hours, how to reach you, and alert them to any upcoming deadlines. The easiest way that I find to contact my advisees (especially as a group) is to go to the UMD Resources for Advisors page. This provides links to many valuable resources including the Advisor Connect page (that you can use to send group emails) as well as to the UMD Graduation Planner.

The screenshot below shows what the UMD Resources for Advisors page looks like: