Today’s listening stations

jen20Technology has made listening centres more welcoming for teachers and students, and you can always discover new ideas to add to your usual listening post activities:

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Do it Yourself with an MP3 Player / iPod Touch / Tablet
If you have access to an MP3 player, a headphone splitter and mini headphones, you can construct a listening station. You can download stories onto the MP3 player from a computer and show one child from each reading group to use the MP3. They can take it in turns to peer teach another member of their group so that everybody is able to use it.

If you do not have books in digital format, you can record readers and big books using GarageBand (Mac) or Audacity (PC) and save them as an MP3 file. Then you can share it into iTunes and transfer it to your MP3 player.

There are other advantages to using iTunes to manage your audio files. The first is variety. iTunes makes it possible for you to add podcasts or apps to your listening centre activities. Secondly, differentiation; you can easily create a playlist in iTunes, with different playlists for different levels, groups or even individuals. Thirdly, navigation; to make it easier for your students to navigate, you can import pictures to illustrate the audio file into iTunes from Amazon.

The really great thing about the MP3 player-style listening station is the mobility. Children can even sit outside under a tree and listen. However, if you don’t have access to any mobile devices, you could still use the headphone splitter, mini headphones and even iTunes on an old desktop. You can then at least go to town decorating the area around your listening station!

Listening activities for your MP3 Players / tablets

• The basic one: Students listen to various stories and complete tasks. There are many free story podcasts available from the iTunes store. Some good ones include Storynory [https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/storynory-stories-for-kids/id94571049] and The Story Home [https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-story-home-childrens-audio/id270352658].
• Students listen to story apps – you can find apps here http://www.apple.com/nz/education/apps/, at google play and recommendations here http://www.iear.org/
• Students watch How-to videos from www.howcast.com and follow the instructions to complete a task such as how to make sushi.
• Students listen to songs or poems and sequence cards containing the lyrics to the song or words to the poem.
• Students listen to a recording of instructions or clues to solve a problem or complete a treasure hunt.
• Students watch short videos from YouTube and again complete a set of response activities.
• Students can also record their own versions of all of the above to create material for other students.

jen20_1Better quality headphones: an Infrared Wireless Headset Kit
With headphones you do get what you pay for. There is nothing more frustrating than a buzz, crackle or hiss. If you are thinking of using a device with a USB port, you may want to invest in something like these wireless infrared headsets (pictured). You simply plug in a “dongle” and it wirelessly transmits the audio via infrared to each headset. The kit includes good-quality headsets with a volume control on each headset so a student can set it at a comfortable level. It also means that the group of students can move away from the computer (and each other!) to sit in bean bags or lie on the floor to undertake their listening, so long as the headsets are within line of sight of the “dongle.” The kit requires no software installation and will transmit the audio of whatever is playing on the computer, be it audio books or YouTube videos.

Differentiated listening activities
If you have access to a number of MP3 players, tablets or netbooks, differentiated listening is possible by downloading different files onto the MP3 player or by setting up different folders or playlists in iTunes on the tablets and netbooks. This is perhaps not so easy to manage with juniors and can be time consuming. There are other options available. Easi-Ears is one such set up (pictured). The teacher installs some software on their laptop that enables them to drag audio files onto one or more of six wireless headset units that sync via a base unit. The base unit is also an MP3 recorder so you and your students can use it to record audio and sync this to the headsets as well, so maybe you can create different instructions for each student to accompany the same audio book.

The headsets are all different colours so that each student can identify their headset. They can then control their own audio, repeating, pausing and moving to the next track to meet their own needs using the controls on the side of the headset. A remote control unit enables a teacher to intervene as required, cut in and broadcast announcements and instructions. And best of all for the littlies, the headset will start to play as soon as you put it on and pause for up to 20 minutes if they are removed.

Ideas for differentiated or independent listening activities:
Each student listens to a different piece of music to inspire story writing, model making or painting pictures and then you can compare or try and match the output with the stimulus.

Each student records their own information for a nature trail or a short journey. The students can swap the headsets and listen to the different versions and compare.

Total empowerment – each student can decide what story they want to listen to, or what skill they want to learn.

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Jenny Barrett


enny is the CEO for Breathe Technology. Her enthusiasm for technology came when thrown in the deep end whilst teaching at a Taiwan high school. Jenny has since undertaken a Master’s of Education (Ed. Technology) and has supported classroom teachers to use educational technology in UK and NZ projects. www.breathetechnology.co.nz