The typical early childhood classroom is full of emerging readers and writers – though few have begun to master these areas, there is a wide variety of pre-reading and pre-writing skills that the young child can accumulate. Oral storytelling can be a useful exercise for the young emerging writer, as it allows him or her to express detailed information or sequences of events without the physically and cognitively taxing work of writing it down. In my classroom, dictation is a popular language work among our younger students. This work typically involves the child choosing a picture and gluing it onto a piece of lined paper. Then, he or she would dictate the information or story to a teacher, who would transcribe it on a piece of paper. To the very young child, this work illustrates an important point that may seem obvious to the rest of us: the words you say or think can be transferred onto paper for others to read.
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| An example of paper dictation work. |
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| The iOS voice memo app. |
With some help from technology, however, we could take this idea in another direction: The words you say can also be recorded for others to hear! This can be achieved with the help of simple voice recording apps. Perhaps the most straightforward (and therefore child-friendly) app I've encountered for this purpose is Apple's Voice Memos on iOS. This app is installed by default on an iPhone or iPod Touch, and provides a very simple user interface: a one red button that both starts and ends a recording. From there, the user is able to create a title, trim the recording's length, or share it. For the purposes of a young child's use, however, all he or she would need to know is how to begin and end their recording. As with other lessons in the Montessori classroom, I expect one demonstration from a teacher or older peer would be enough of an introduction for the child to use this app successfully.
As for the content of one's recording: it could be used quite similarly to the paper dictation work, where the child responds to an image they see. I envision this work having a stationary setup, where the child could sit with the device and an image they must describe. Perhaps it could be used in conjunction with a story we've heard recently: A copy of a page could be provided, and the child must then summarize what happened with Voice Memos. The possibilities are wide open, as the images used can be changed as often as the teacher likes!
After a recording is made in Voice Memos, it is saved in a list above the record button. There is some good potential here for adding a communal or social aspect to the work – it might be fun and interesting for a child to not just make their own recording, but also listen to a friend's! Differing interpretations or summaries of an image will expose the child to other ideas, while giving them the independence to create their own version of this information.
If a work like this were rolled out in my classroom, there are a few foreseeable issues. First, the question of appropriate use: what if the child, either accidentally or through tech savvy, exits the app to do something else? An answer to this potential problem lies in Guided Access, a setting found on all iOS devices. When activated, Guided Access keeps the device in one app only, without the ability to exit to the home screen. One could even disable certain virtual buttons onscreen, such as the Edit or Share buttons. Guided Access would ensure that the child is unable to use the device for anything other than its intended purpose. To enable Guided Access, go to Settings > General > Accessibility, then scroll down to find Guided Access.
Depending on one's school policies, using an iPhone for classroom activities may be frowned upon. In this instance, there are other options for voice recording apps to use on different devices. While the iOS Voice Memos app is unfortunately not available for iPads, there are a number of other free voice recording apps on the App Store, such as Otter Voice Notes or Voice Recorder Lite.
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