Some notes on using the Microsoft Learning Suite

 

SONGSMITH

If you are a musician this programme will drive you mad!  The chords are random and don’t fit what is in your head.  If you are not a musician you will enjoy the fun of it!  Kids love it!

Load the programme

Write some words you want to sing – could be about anything – don’t get carried away with anything too lyrical or fancy.

Open the programme and select NEW SONG

You will see a screen where you can choose the style you want

Scroll to listen. Select the style you think fits your song and click next.

Choose the tempo and click finish:

Press the record button and when it says SING, start singing.

When you have finished, press STOP and it will play back to you.

If you like the song, SAVE,

If you don’t, UNDO and try again.

For a new song, press “SONG STARTER”

Other options:

·        Change the number of chords in the bar

·        Add an intro or ending off bar.

PHOTOSTORY

Select the pictures you want to use and put them into a folder. (This step is optional but it really makes life much easier)

Open Photostory and create a new story.

Step 1:   IMPORT pictures – you can do this one at a time or import all the pictures you are using at once.  Get the order right by pressing the left and right arrows on the screen.  You can also edit your pictures on this screen.

Step 2:  ADD A TITLE – Write what title you want to add and edit it  - font, colour and where you want it on the page.  Do this for each of your slides (or you can do it one slide at a time)

Step 3: CUSTOMISE MOTION – the programme will do this automatically but you can make your own changes – change the speed, change the starting and ending points, etc.

  

Step 4: COMPOSE AND RECORD NARRATION – write what it is you want to record and then record it (or you can get all the narration in first and record screen by screen later)

Step 5: ADD MUSIC – you can use music you have already on your computer or you can ask the programme to synthesise some for you.

Step 6: SAVE your Photostory.

Save it as a PROJECT if you want to come back and work on it later.  Save it for playback if you are happy with it.  This will save it as a .wmv file (Windows Media Video) which you can play on a computer (not an a DVD player).  You can resave it as a .flv file if you want to upload it to Youtube.