This is just too cool for words. Cole Camplese, a professor at Penn State, has figured out a way to use his iPod to help him grade many more (short) student writing assignments very quickly. Here’s how it works:
- The professor assigns a short reading to the class. Every student is expected to respond with a short post to the class discussion board.
- The professor creates a grading rubric that simplifies the scoring of the student submission to one scoring number. (I assume the professor distributes the rubric to the class as well.)
- Software translates the student text postings into speech and records it as a sound file (presumably with accompanying metadata regarding who the student is and what the assignment is).
- The professor downloads the student posts, now in spoken form, to an iPod.
- Using the one-click rating feature, the professor rates each post based on the rubric.
- Optionally, the professor adds audio feedback using a microphone add-on to the iPod.
- The professor sync’s the iPod with a desktop computer, uploading the scores into some grade tracking software (and, presumably, the audio comments to some place where students can access them).
Best part of all: Camplese claims he already has a working system that does this.
(Found via Mark Oehlert’s eClippings.)