apcampbell

EFL podcaster extraordinaire, Graham Stanley (via Nick Noakes), turns our attention to Bubbleshare.com, a web-based application allowing users to create slide shows from photos accompanied by audio captions. Using Bubbleshare is as easy as creating an account, uploading a batch of photos, and then recording a message for each one. After that, with the click of a mouse you can publish to your blog, and even do a photocast, meaning anyone lucky enough to have one of those new iPods is in for a real treat!

Bubbleshare would lend itself well to EFL/ESL classes. Learners could work in small groups to collaborate on making slideshow presentations on topics of great relevance to their lives. They could negotiate a topic, co-plan the steps, delegate tasks, go out in the field to take photos, compose and re-edit the text, and record the voice captions; the entire process recorded and shared with others on a blog.  And the act of publishing the presentation is just the beginning, not the end! From there it would involve presenting it in such a way as to link it with blog posts and related resources already published, tagging it with keywords, and following up on any comments left by readers. They don’t even have to be advanced students either; with the proper guidance, it can be accomplished by advanced beginners and intermediates. Oh, did I mention this was a language class?