Did you know you can add comments to students’ (or colleagues’) Word documents, both in text and voice format?
You can enter comments both on particular words and on whole sections. The highlighted text will be placed within a pair of brackets, with a line going over to a pink ‘bubble’ over on the right-hand side of the document, in which the text or voice object is visible. To listen to the voice recording, just double-click it.
Here’s how you can enter a text comment:
- Highlight a word or paragraph. Click Insert >> Comment (or hold the <Alt> key and press I, M and then release the keys).
- The pink ‘bubble’ appears, and you can type in the comment.
Here’s how to enter a voice comment:
- You need to first display the Reviewing toolbar, and will most likely need to add the “Insert Voice” button to this toolbar.
- To display the Reviewing toolbar, click View >> Toolbars >> Reviewing.
- If there is no “Insert Voice” button, click the tiny little arrow in the bottom right corner of the Reviewing toolbar, then Add or Remove buttons >> Reviewing, and put a checkmark next to Insert Voice.
The right-most button on the toolbar is now the Insert Voice button. To enter a voice comment, select a word or portion of text, and click the button. The now familiar pink ‘bubble’ appears on the right. However, the Sound Recorder program loads and you just click the Record button, read a brief and succinct comment, and click the Stop button.
The voice comment is embedded in the pink ‘bubble’, and when you send the Word document back to the original author, they can click the sound object and listen to your comment.
Note: the sound files must be short, or the Word document becomes very big! Therefore, students should probably not store these permanently, just use them during editing.
Nadine Dickinson said
May 16 2008 @ 2:17 pm
Love this! Will definitely start next school year doing more “electronic” marking of this kind. Thanks.
Ståle Brokvam said
May 16 2008 @ 2:21 pm
With the voice comments, just bear in mind the need to be succinct, though, as long, rambling recordings will bloat the files and make them very unwieldy to send as attachments.
You can, of course, use a combination of text and voice comments. The sound of the teacher’s voice can certainly be a difference that makes a difference, but certain things may be easier to explain in writing.
vidavergel said
May 19 2008 @ 6:37 am
I’ve tried the written comments, and it works. Next thing to try is the voice. I need to plan what to say, though. . .
Thank you!
Gigi said
July 18 2008 @ 7:42 am
thanks for sharing this one! what does one do if he would like to remove a comment he/she has placed?
Gigi said
July 18 2008 @ 7:43 am
what does one do if he would like to remove a comment he/she has placed?
Ståle Brokvam said
July 19 2008 @ 1:51 am
To delete a comment in Microsoft Word, just right-click it and select Delete comment. If you inserted a voice comment, saving the file should also remove the sound file you’d recorded. (However, I cannot test this just now as I’m writing on a machine that doesn’t have a microphone).