Minutes for October  28 , 2004 - 4 P.M. –  5 :00 P.M. CTL Workroom

In attendance at the DLMG meeting  Sheryl Girard, Amadou Gaye,  Jennifer Townsley, Chuck Hall,   Ken Costello  and Peggy Johnson  .

Ken Costello instructed the group on how to use free Audacity software to record, edit, and upload audio files to the internet. 

DOWNLOADING AUDACITY

Audacity is a free software program that makes it relatively easy to create and edit audio files to put on the web. It is a small enough program that you can even carry the whole program on a thumb drive with you to different computers (Audacity software does not have to be installed on a computer to use Audacity). Use this URL to download a copy of Audacity to your computer (assuming you have a Windows machine) : http://audacity.sourceforge.net/  or you can always type in "Audacity" into a search engine (such as www.google.com ) to find a download source.

Select the appropriate platform you use (Windows or Macintosh) and download the file named audacity-win. exe into folder on your computer (such as the Program Files folder).

DOWNLOADING LAME

You also want to download the LAME MP3 Encoder Library. This enables Audacity to save files as MP3 if you so choose. MP3 provides a good compression (small file size), which is highly desirable. If you are on a Windows machine, this page has the LAME Encoder:  http://audacity.sourceforge.net/windows.php

Hint: It will make it easier for you late if you download the LAME MP3 Encoder into the same folder as the Audacity program you downloaded. Otherwise, the first time you use Audacity and tell it to save a file as MP3, you will have to browse to show Audacity where the LAME MP3 encoder is located.

RUNNING AUDACITY

Load Audacity by opening the exe file you downloaded. I've attached a document with directions on how to run the program.

SITE TO BOOKMARK

Ken also showed another site from which you can download Audacity, as well as other free software. Look under multimedia files at this site to find Audacity. It's a great site to bookmark:  http://www.pricelessware.org/thelist/index.htm

Directions for using Audacity can be found on the CTL homepage http://www.mc.maricopa.edu/other/ctl/_ctl_SD/resources/helpdocs/how_to/index.html. _____________________________________________________________

WHAT'S COMING

At this week's DLMG meeting (Nov. 4), Melanie will show us how to easily create online learning games for our students.  We meet at 4 P.M. in AS192.

The semester is fast winding down.  Nov. 11 is Veteran's Day holiday.  Paul Hietter will show us how to use Calibrated Peer Review where students grade one another's essays online on Nov. 18.  Then Thanksgiving holiday is November 25. Dec. 2, Jennifer T., Stacey, and Sheryl will show what they have developed for their online course. On Dec. 9, Jennifer G., Amadou, and Charles will do the same. These two December sessions are the last chance you have for feedback from the group. With your courses starting in January, you will want to have as much completed as possible by the end of this semester. It will make life easier for you once you begin having actual students in your class!

Peg Johnson