Chapter7
Audio
Hearing and listening
Hearing is an accidental and automatic brain response to sound that requires no effort. We are surrounded by sounds most of the time. For example, we are accustomed to the sounds of airplanes, lawn mowers, furnace blowers, the rattling of pots and pans, and so on. We hear those incidental sounds and, unless we have a reason to do otherwise, we train ourselves to ignore them. We learn to filter out sounds that mean little to us, just as we choose to hear our ringing cell phones and other sounds that are more important to us.
Listening, on the other hand, is purposeful and focused rather than accidental. As a result, it requires motivation and effort. Listening, at its best, is active, focused, concentrated attention for the purpose of understanding the meanings expressed by a speaker. We do not always listen at our best, however, and later in this chapter we will examine some of the reasons why and some strategies for becoming more active critical listeners.
2. developing listening skills
Communication isn't just about talking with others and sharing stories, ideas, goals, and desires. Effective communication often involves listening skills that develop your ability to really absorb what others say, and listen with an open mind. Just like becoming a better speaker, there are many benefits of becoming a better listener. By developing better listening skills, you will be able to get more information out of the conversations you have, increase others' trust in you, and people will be drawn to your inviting personality.
Have inviting body language, there are:
Raising your eyebrows every once in a while.
Moving slightly closer toward the person speaking to you.
Smiling and laughing when it is appropriate.
Tilting your head when hearing new or interesting information.
Nodding your head if you agree or understand what someone is saying.
Keep eye contact
Listen without distraction
Turning off communication devices like cell phones is a polite and easy way to get rid of further distractions
Take note of the speaker's body language
Since words only convey a fraction of the message, "listening" to body language cues can help you further understand what the speaker is trying to communicate besides what their words convey.
Listen with the intent to learn
You might not be knowledgeable or fascinated with every topic of discussion, but listening with the intent to learn offers other points of view different from your own, and a chance for you to grow as a listener.
Be open minded
Be open to the idea that your scope of seeing things may not be the only, or necessarily the best way of seeing the world.
Audio formats
An audio file format is a file format for storing digital audio data on a computer system. The bit layout of the audio data (excluding metadata) is called the audio coding format and can be uncompressed, or compressed to reduce the file size, often using loss compression. The data can be a raw bit stream in an audio coding format, but it is usually embedded in a container format or an audio data format with defined storage layer.
There are three major groups of audio file formats:
Uncompressed audio formats, such as WAV, AIFF, AU or raw header-less PCM; Formats with lossless compression, such as FLAC, Monkey's Audio (filename extension. ape), WavPack (filename extension. wv), TTA, ATRAC Advanced Lossless, ALAC (filename extension .m4a), MPEG-4 SLS, MPEG-4 ALS, MPEG-4 DST, Windows Media Audio Lossless (WMA Lossless), and Shorten (SHN).
Formats with lossy compression, such as Opus, MP3, Vorbis, Musepack, AAC, ATRAC and Windows Media Audio Lossy (WMA lossy).
Producing class materials on cassette tapes/audio
Cassette tape production delayed due to global shortage of materials
Despite being technologically outdated, a BPI (British Phonographic Industry) report earlier this year revealed that a cassette tape resurgence was taking place as nearly 35,000 cassette tapes were sold in the UK for the first half of 2019.
In contrast, around 18,000 tapes had been sold by the same point in 2018.
When it came to artists proving successful on tape, Billie Eilish has secured the top spot selling 4,000 copies of her debut album When We Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?
It was followed by Catfish and The Bottlemens the Balance at 2 on 3,000 cassette sales, with Madonnas Madame X at no.3, Lewis Capaldis Divinely Uninspired to A Hellish Extent at four and Hoziers Wasteland Baby completing the top five.
Duplicating and editing audiotapes
Benefits of our cassette duplication include:
Real time tape duplication on high quality Tascam cassette decks
Minimum orders start at just 20 cassettes
The cassettes are wound with tape to the exact length that you require
Cassettes come in clear cases with double-sided full colour printing on the cassette and a double-sided full colour printed J-card in the case
Over 60 different cassette tape colors available (see below), with play lengths up to 120 minutes.
Competitive pricing that includes UK delivery (international delivery available) and can offer quick turnaround times.
Selecting audio materials
Well-produced audio materials can motivate students to actively engage and enjoy learning. For instance, teaching Kindergarten pupils about rhymes using compact discs has resulted to a meaningful learning experience. My pupils who are of mixed heritage and backgrounds have shown interest towards the lesson and activities. The pieces of information on the types of audio materials have led me into analyzing the benefits that they can bring into the classroom instruction. Cassette recorders, compact discs, multimedia CD-ROMS, and audio podcast are among the few types I have focused on. Audio podcast which is a newly-emerged type of pre-recorded audio program has quite sparked my interest. It would be an exciting feat to learn how to incorporate audio podcast in the modern classroom instruction. In connection, the types of audio materials have their distinctive attributes which teachers have to bear in mind. Audio cassette recorders are easy to use in instruction yet have a limited capacity for storage of data. In such case, teachers need to utilize a number of audiotapes. Audio cassette recorder can also be utilized by teachers through recording the students reading ability at the beginning and end of the school year. Then, comparison and contrast can be conducted between previous and recent reading performance rate. Its also noteworthy to mention that the audio podcast can provide students the opportunity to learn while multitasking.
Utilizing audio materials
The use of audio is well established in education and has been used for decades. From the humble audio cassettes of the 1970s, to accompanying nearly all video recordings, audio has a long history as a teaching and learning aid. Audio as a format has great breadth and depth which means there is great potential for its use in education. Audio...demonstrated a capacity to facilitate authentic engagement, allowing students to connect in various ways to the outside world, both as listeners and publishers. The ease and speed with which digital audio can be deployed was used to support timely interventions and in some cases promoted information currency and responsiveness."
Beyond podcasting: creative approaches to designing educational audio ALT-J, Research in Learning Technology, Andrew Middleton p153
Require learners participation
In our model lesson, the plan for learner participation is as follows:
Students will work in groups of four to engage each other in rational discourse on the following key questions.
What is the role of the ICT devices in the Jamaican Educational System and how does this impact teaching and learning?
What benefits can be derived, if any from the use of ICT devices in the classroom?
What is the impact of the eLearning Project on learning Jamaica?
How will the further development of technology impact the relationship between teachers and students?
Identify three limitations of technology use in the classroom.
After small group discussion, individual groups will be asked to share the highlights of their discussion with the entire class via a PowerPoint presentation. Students will be required to set up projector and computer on their own.
Evaluate and Revise:
Lastly, evaluating and revising is a very vital step. Becoming a good teacher requires that you constantly evaluate your teaching, evaluate students' learning, and make needed revisions for the next lesson and for the next time you teach the current lesson. Always striving to improve. Evaluation occurs when you determine the worth of teaching methods and the media used. During the evaluation stage, you can ask yourself questions such as, Did this lesson meet the objectives? Did students gain from this lesson? Can this lesson be improved? How so? Could individual work or group work have been more effective for parts of this lesson? Was the media appropriate? Are there other technology solutions that might have worked better? You may also ask students to reflect on their learning and the experience they had in the lesson. Students may have feedback that could help you to improve the lesson for next time, or feedback that could help you improve future lessons for them.
