Digital Storytelling - Fotobabble or Blabberize

Here's a little activity I did with my 8 year olds.  www.fotobabble.com and www.blabberize.com are very similar sites except you can add a "mouth" to Blabberize which makes it more fun for students.  You can also upload sound files, which isn't possible with Fotobabble.  I used Blabberize for this activity.  www.fotobabble.com  is simpler and quicker and, if you have an iPhone, there is an app so you can do everything on your phone.  An app for Android is coming soon according to the website so keep an eye out.

In this activity, my young learners talked about themselves, but language and topic can be adapted for ALL ages and levels.




Description:  Students create a poster, then upload it to a website and talk about it.
Time:  60-90 minutes
Age:  Any
Level: Any

Materials 

• strips of coloured paper 
• small squares of white paper to draw a picture (optional)
• A4 sheets of coloured paper - one for each student
• scissors, crayons, glue
• smartphone or camera, microphone and class computer or netbooks
• www.blabberize.com or www.fotobabble.com

 Procedure

1. Review language you want to practise. 
2. Put strips of coloured paper in a pile on a chair or table. Handout sheets of coloured paper and optional white paper
3. Students write one sentence on each strip of paper, draw and colour the picture (optional) and stick on paper.
4. Take photo of finished poster and upload to your class computer, netbooks or iPhone (if you're using Fotobabble).

Digitise

1. Students read and record the content of their poster (you can vary this according to level)
2. Go to www.blabberize.com and upload the image.  (It is optional to place a "mouth", if students have netbooks, it's a fun idea, if you are doing it in a hurry just skip this part) or use www.Fotobabble.com
3. Students record their narration.
4. Show completed Blabberizes/Fotobabbles to class

Follow Up Ideas

• Students "Review" each other's Blabberizes/Fotobabbles
• Compare and contrast speaking activities (depending on topic/language)
• Discussion activities (depending on topic/language)
• Writing essay, report, etc. 
• Use for language revision/recycling
• Pronunciation issues

Classroom Management Tips
If you've got 12 younger or teenage students it will be difficult to keep them quiet while one student is recording.  If you can get your hands on a microphone extension, send the recording student outside (or the netbook/iPhone).  If you haven't got any of those, play FREEZE (with or without freeze cards).  Give a student a freeze card (a card with "freeze" written on it:)).  Just before someone starts recording, The freeze card holder counts down from 5 then shouts freeze holding up the card.  All the students have to stop talking (but allow them to continue with their posters if they haven't finished yet).  Remarkably, it works!