Using Screencast-O-Matic in the Classroom
Every day, there is at least one student missing from school in any given classroom. The burden of catching-up the student ends up falling on the teacher’s shoulders. On top of all of the other work she has to do (grading, lesson planning, master’s class Tumblr posting, classroom cleanliness, daily preparation, motherhood, cooking/cleaning, and we’re not even halfway done!) the teacher now has to figure out how to meet the lesson objectives quickly and painlessly (for all parties involved), without resorting to putting on a 40-minute lecture for one student who had the sniffles and stayed home.Â
Fortunately for all of us, there’s a relatively new educational tool on the market: Screencast-O-Matic. We were exposed to this during our November professional development day, and I think it’s clever. Like, “Why didn’t I come up with this? I could retire early and buy an island next to Leonardo DiCaprio” clever. Basically, a teacher is able to record audio, video, audio and on-screen motion, or any audio/visual combination and post or save the recording.Â
Education World mentioned that one draw-back to the program is that there is a free and paid version. The free version has a time limit on the amount you can record at any given time. It is a highly reviewed educational application on that cite.Â
I see myself using this in my classroom during teaching. I teach near my laptop, so I could kill two birds with one stone. I can teach my usual lesson, record it, and post it for students to reference back to or for those absent students to catch-up on. I would have to do it in two 15-minute segments, but I think it is entirely doable. I could even pause the video during transitional time so that there is no lag time on the clip.Â
Below is a tutorial clip on how to set up Screencast-O-Matic, and another video of an example of how Screencast-O-Matic could be used in a younger setting.Â