Areas of Learning: Knowledge and Understanding of the World, Personal, Social and Emotional Development.
Context: Children had been listening to different sounds in the environment. They had been counting sounds outside and naming sounds played on the computer.
Learning Intentions: To use a computer microphone to record a voice or sound. (KUW)
To listen and identify different children's voices or sounds. (KUW)
Success Criteria: I know/can record my voice using the computer microphone.
Key Vocabulary: microphone, sound recorder (program), voice, sound, loud, quiet, stop, record, play, speakers

You will need: You will need: A microphone attached to a computer or a laptop with an inbuilt microphone.
Sound Recorder (Click for more information and help using this program.)
Pre-recorded files of different adults from the school speaking or singing a nursery rhyme!

Show children the microphone and ask what they think it does. Discuss how it might work and look at where it plugs in to the computer. Ask children which part of the computer they will use to listen to any sounds recorded.

Tell children you have used the microphone to record some people's voices. Play the recorded voices to the children and ask them to guess who they are listening to.

In small groups demonstrate how to use the Sound Recorder program

Ask children to take turns to record themselves singing a nursery rhyme into the microphone. It works well if you rotate activities in the group e.g. one child holds the microphone, one child sings and one child clicks record on the sound recorder.

Let all the children have their turn and save each child's rhymes as individual files.

During a plenary session ask the group to sit at the front on chairs so that the class can see them clearly. Play back the voices and ask the class to see if they can name the speaker of each rhyme!

Set the microphone up on the computer with a few nursery rhyme books. Let children play in pairs, taking turns to record each others voices. Encourage them to search the classroom for other sources of sound and let them experiment with recording these!

This might be a good opportunity to discuss the volume on the speakers and how loud they need it to be when they listen back to the sounds!

Thinking Questions: Which parts of the computer did we use to record our voices?
Which part did we use to listen to our voices?
What buttons did you have to press to record and listen to your voice?
How can we make our voices sound louder or quieter on the computer?
How did your voice sound when you listened to it on the speakers?
What other sounds could we record on the computer?

Help: Sound Recorder

Sound Recorder is a very simple program found on most Windows PC's, try looking in the Accessories
folder.

Before you can use the program you will need to plug a microphone into the back of the PC, on most computers the correct socket will be marked with a microphone icon. (If you are using a laptop check to see to see if their is an internal microphone.)

Sound Recorder is very similar to a tape recorder so it is a good idea to discuss the similarities and differences with the children.

Use...

record to record children's voices or sounds.

stop to stop recording.

rewind to find the beginning of the recording.

play to play the recording.