ELT Tech Tools Blog: Screencast-O-Matic

Making Videos to Teach and Learn English

Source: https://ctl.mesacc.edu

Communicative vs Digital Competence

As our world changes, new types of correlations affecting language learning emerge. A good debate to consider was presented by Walker & White (2013). Communicative competence, as it had already been described by a model, consists of four integrated areas: linguistic competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence and strategic competence. Digital competence, on the other hand, has also been described by four integrated areas: procedural competence, socio-digital competence, digital discourse competence and strategic competence. The assumption is each technology is designed for a specific type of learners, with a certain digital competence so teachers must be aware of these terms if they are to introduce new technologies to their learners.

According to Wikipedia, Screencast refers to any recording of a screen output accompanied normally by audio narration. So a screencast software, such as Screencast-O-Matic, allows you to record what is happening on your screen while you are talking. When recording, you can have a small screen containing a video of you and a larger one containing a video of your PC screen or vice versa depending on your need, so you are able to record three things at the same time: your voice, your video and your screen. The videos below show how to use Screencast-O-Matic.

Video 1

Video 2

Video 3

How can it enhance teaching & learning?

A pioneer in the use of ELT training videos is Russell Stannard who created a wonderful website containing videos about learning technologies. Following the same approach, if you are a teacher trainer, you can make videos about any theme by having some PowerPoint slides and your voice, thus you don't have to repeat the same thing over and over again wherever you go and your trainees will have the advantage of getting back to what you said whenever they want. It also reduces your preparation time if you are a busy bee and you can use it in your lectures and workshops.

Productive skills are rarely dealt with specifically speaking, this tool allows your students to make their own videos with sufficient time to reflect, edit and reproduce them. Ideally, this task is practical for us in Sudan because the connection is not always stable, therefore being online to record does not apply in these circumstances, unlike other software such as Blackboard Collaborative where students must be online and respond immediately. Students will just need to download it then they might use their email to send it to you or bring it in a USB stick. In addition to appropriateness of use and reflection benefits, it gives teachers enough time to assess students' speaking performance. I used to have students speaking in front of me while asking them some questions. Later on, I started to audio record their speech in order to give them fair marks by listening again to the speech/dialogue and evaluate it in a better way. This is common worldwide and is adopted in IELTS, however, the immediate conversation does not reflect students' linguistic competence. When students speak at their own pace, at a time that works for them, they can produce a better output.

A reflective point

Although the use of Screencast-O-Matic by students is a great way to help evaluate their speaking skill, they can write a well structured text and just read it with good pronunciation which turns the activity into reading activity instead of a speaking one. Additionally, if you have a big class, you may confuse students' voice thus may not possibly decipher who recorded what. This dilemma can be worse if you have naughty students with high-tech abilities that enable them to play with the sound. So, it is recommended not to use it for formal assessment, unless you guarantee the procedure. It is still great as a speaking practice tool that works if you use it properly.