Name of the Web 2.0
Tool:
Please select the one,
primary category for this tool: Creativity tool with photos
Please describe this
tool in your own words (a minimum of 150-250 words).
Blabberize is a tool
that allows a user to upload a photo of a person, people, animal, or whatever
they would like to create a talking image.
This image is referred to as a “Blabber” and can be used for a number of
reasons both educationally and just for fun. The tool is free and utilizes
either the user’s own photos or those that are downloaded onto their computer
for use with the tool. Once the user has
uploaded the photo that they want to Blabberize, they must select the mouth or
jaw region that will be used to create the moving mouth. Drawing the mouth is somewhat time-consuming
and it’s difficult to see if it is going to work correctly or turn out as
expected without several attempts to get it right. The tool then allows the user to either
record their own audio or they can simply locate a .wav file online, save it to
a file and upload it into the blabber. Then, when the user clicks the play
button, Blabberize puts the moving mouth and audio message together for a
moving mouth with sound.
Download and install a
program or plug-in for the tool to work properly?
The tool does not
require that the user install a program or download a plug-in. However, in order to save the “blabber” that
the user has created, they must create an account using their email address.
What do you need to
know before using this tool? (What skills do you need to have?)
Overall, this is a
very simple-to-use tool that anyone could likely figure out after one or a few
tries. The user only needs the ability
to upload a photo, draw the mouth, and upload or record the audio to accompany
the photo and make it “talk”.
What do you need to
have before using this tool?
To effectively use the
tool users need a microphone and a photo. Accessibility to files for
download and an email address if they choose to save their Blabberize
creations.
How do you use this
tool? (Write the basic steps using a numbered list)
2. Click on “Make” and the screen below will appear:
3. Click on “Browse”
to upload a photo.
4. If the user chooses
to do so, they can crop the photo.
5. Begin to “draw” the
mouth by selecting the area and dragging the green and blue dots to make the
perfect mouth.
Start
Finished “mouth”
6. Click the arrow button and
the audio box will appear allowing the user to either record audio using a
microphone, a telephone, or upload a .wav file.
The audio has a maximum length of 30 seconds. Select one of these 3 and upload audio to the
blabber. Then, click OK. The user can then press the button to play
the blabber to see the photo and audio merged with the mouth moving.
7. That is all that
needs to be done to create a blabber. However, if you want to save and embed or send
the blabber creation, a user must create a free account. If the user chooses to create an account,
they will enter a username, password, and email address. Blabberize will then as the user to title the
blabber creation, provide a description, and create tags. The user can also select either “private” or
“mature”.
8. In order to share
it, the user selects the web address or has the opportunity to embed it into
the document or photo.
Locate or create your own
example of an educational resource created with this tool
Please describe a
scenario of how you might use this tool in a teaching environment.
As many online
reviewers pointed out, this could be used for educators to have their students
present information on a topic or individual.
An instructor could also use it as a weekly teaching tool for students
to learn about different events or individuals. In my environment, I may
utilize it to share snippets of information with our trainees that can be sent
in an email or posted on an electronic bulletin board. However, I think that there are many more
valuable ways to get information across, so I likely wouldn't use this gimmicky
tool.
What are the
advantages and disadvantages of using this tool in a formal or informal
teaching environment?
Advantages: free,
entertaining, no sign-up required if the user doesn’t want to save or share
blabber creations, fairly user-friendly, could potentially be used for student
engagement and teaching
Disadvantages: have to
sign in to save creations, drawing the mouth can get somewhat frustrating after
multiple attempts, audio limited to 30 second snippets which isn’t much time
for a true educational teaching use, each audio file that I uploaded cut off
too soon
Would you recommend
this Web 2.0 tool to others, or suggest that they explore a different tool?
I would likely not
recommend this tool to anyone above elementary or maybe middle school
education. It wasn't that it is
difficult to use and the sign up wasn’t even that big of an issue, instead it
took a great deal of time to get the mouth right. I think it would be humorous the first few
times, but after that I don’t know that my learners would take it serious and
grow weary of it pretty quickly.
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