Voki.com Review
Talking avatar creator
This program allows users to personalize an avatar and make it speak. According to wikipedia, "an avatar is the graphical representation of the user or the user's alter ego or character" [1]. To create an avatar, the user must pick a face, hair style, mouth, clothing, accessories and coloring to represent his or herself. Users can then add voice to their avatars by phone, microphone, uploading an audio file, or by typing in what they want their avatars to say. They can also change the background scene. Once a user creates his or her avatar, the avatar can be published.
Overall, this program is easy to use. It can be fun for students to make representational figures of themselves online and add their own voices to them. It's a creative way to express oneself. However, I am not quite sure how teachers can implement this into many classroom activities. While it can be a fun and/or funny activity for students, it doesn't seem to have much more educational purposes. I do think it is a very creative way, though, for students to express themselves.
I like how there are many options on how to physically depict your avatar. It's also great how there are many ways to add voice to the creation. These offer more ways for students to make it as personal as possible. I think this program is good for elementary aged students, perhaps grades 3-5. It may be a little too complicated for younger students, but too simple for older students. Grades 3-5 are also good ages for students to express themselves in new ways, such as by creating avatars! It's an inspiring program because it offers users a chance to make themselves in a new way or show themselves in the way they'd like to be shown. It's also very fun and gratifying to literally be able to add your voice to something you've created. This program is best used by individual students, rather than in groups. Since the purpose is to create an avatar, or a representation of oneself, it's a good idea to let each student create an avatar for his or herself. This program is probably best used for creative art purposes or for some kind of social activity. It can also be used, however, as another way to present information in class. For instance, instead of students doing "live" speeches to the class, it offers another way for oral presentations to be made. The students can record their speeches on the program and then play them for the class at a later time.
User-friendliness: neutral
Image/Audio quality: high
Educational level: low
Entertainment level: low
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