What is VoiceThread?
A VoiceThread is a collaborative, multimedia slide show that holds images, documents, and videos and allows people to navigate slides and leave comments in several ways – text, voice, audio file, or webcam. Faculty can create and share a VoiceThread with students and colleagues for them to review in presentation mode or to record comments for increased engagement and feedback. Users can doodle (annotate) while commenting, use multiple identities, and pick which comments are shown through moderation.
Get Inspired
With VoiceThread, faculty and students can:
- Demonstrate procedures to help students prepare for a practical exam
- Explain decisions when selecting subjects for a painting’s composition
- Flip a classroom experience to support multiple learning styles
- Foster greater community in large, lecture-based classes
- Interpret linear composition of a painting or note other elements
- Debate the pros and cons of a controversial issue
- Practice foreign language skills during role-play
- Report on field experiences
- Critique a classmate’s composition
Get Started
VoiceThread is integrated into Brightspace by your administrator, so you can simply follow the steps below to pull it into your course.
Classic Course
- Navigate to the “Content” area for your course.
- Click on the “Existing Activities”.
- Select “VoiceThread” from the menu.
- Either create a graded assignment or a individual VoiceThread
- Give the link a title and description if you’d like.
NOTE: The description cannot contain any line breaks or multiple paragraphs. - If you will be creating a graded assignment, remember to enable grading. This option is called “Enable Evaluation”.
- Submit.
Setting up Your VoiceThread Link
After you have added VoiceThread to your course, you’ll need to decide what you want students to see when they click on that link. Start by clicking on the link you’ve just created. This will show you the VoiceThread Setup page, where you can select the option that best fits your needs. These options are detailed below.
Note: If you want VoiceThread integrated with your gradebook, you must use the Assignment Builder.
Course View
Display the collection of VoiceThreads that have been shared with your course. Anything that has not yet been explicitly shared with your course will not appear here.
This is a good option when you want students to find and comment on each other’s work or if you want to allow students to review all course materials prior to an exam.
Individual VT
Display any VoiceThread that you have created. When students click on the link, they’ll see just this one VoiceThread.
This option is the best way to create a VoiceThread discussion board or lecture. Students will not need to look through a collection of VoiceThreads to find the correct one; they will be taken straight to it.
VT Home
Display all of a student’s VoiceThread content in a single view. This includes all VoiceThreads and all courses that belong to them.
This option is useful if you want to create a simple portal into VoiceThread without directing students to any specific content.
Assignment Builder
Create a graded assignment for students to complete. You can require them to create a VoiceThread of their own to submit, to comment on a VoiceThread you’ve created, or simply to watch a VoiceThread start to finish.
After you’ve selected the type of assignment you’d like to create, you’ll be walked through the steps to complete the setup process. You can include a description for your assignment, select a VoiceThread you’ve created for the Comment or Watch Assignment, decide whether students are allowed to resubmit their assignments or if the first submission is final, and even require a specific number of comments for the Comment Assignment.
Student Assignment Submission
When students click on the link for a graded assignment, they will see the assignment you’ve created. They can immediately create or select a VoiceThread to submit for the Create Assignment, record comments on your VoiceThread for the Comment Assignment, or watch the VoiceThread for the Watch Assignment. As soon as they click on the “Submit Assignment” button, you will be able to grade their work.
Grading Student Work
When you’re ready to grade a VoiceThread assignment, simply return to your course and click on the VoiceThread link again. This will display the grader.
Click on a student’s name on the right to see that student’s submission. You can click on each comment below his or her name individually to jump directly to it. Enter a grade on a percentage scale (0-100), and hit “Enter” on your keyboard. This grade will immediately be entered into your Brightspace course gradebook.
* Note: If you have set the assignment to be worth less than 100 points, still grade it on a scale of 0-100, and the score will be adjusted accordingly in your gradebook.
If you have students who have not yet submitted their assignments, click on the “Remind” button to send them an email reminder. Click “Remind all students” to send an email to everyone who has not yet submitted.