If you’re not already familiar with Mote, it’s the most user friendly tool out there for adding voice comments to Google Docs, Google Slides, Google Sheet, and Google Classroom. But now Mote isn’t just for leaving audio recordings as a comment. Their newest feature allows you to easily create audio recordings that you can drag and drop wherever you want on your slides. And best of all, you can use Mote for Google Slides for free!
How to Get Mote for Google Slides
The first thing you’ll need to do is go to the Chrome Web Store. You’re going to want to do this even if you already have Mote installed as an Extension on your browser.
Type Mote in the search box, and then click on the extension. Since the Google Slides audio update is brand new, you might need to uninstall Mote from your browser by clicking Remove from Chrome, and then click on the link to quickly reinstall it again.
Once you’ve reinstalled Mote, or installed it for the first time, go over to a Google Slides and open a slide deck to which you want to add audio. You’ll know Mote has been updated if you see a purple M icon show up next to the Present button.
How to Add Audio to Google Slides
Let’s say you wanted to add a voice explanation about the content of your Slides for asynchronous learning. All you need to do is click on the Mote icon, and then click on the icon in the box that pops up. The spinning circle tells you that it’s recording, and when you’re ready to finish, click on the purple M icon again.
Then you can click the play button to hear your audio again, or you can click the trash can to start over. Once you’re ready to insert the audio, click insert, and you’ll see a little audio file pop up on your Slides.
On the audio playback menu, you can choose whether you want the audio to start playing when you or your students click on it, or if you want the audio to start playing automatically once you open your slides.
Then, you can resize your audio file and drag it around wherever you want it to go. If you choose to have the audio play automatically, as soon as you enter present mode, it will start playing. And if you choose to play it on click, you or your students would need to manually click on the audio file in order to get it to start playing.
Conclusion & Resources
Mote is an easy-to-use tool that allows you to add audio directly to your Google Slides for free.
For additional strategies for how to use technology to personalize learning, increase engagement, foster creativity, and more, click here:
How to Use Education Technology: The Ultimate Guide
And to read more about why I believe technology must be a central part of public education today, click here:
Why Education Technology?: The Ultimate Guide
Interested in the software I use to create my videos? Check out the links below! Many of these products offer a free trial to start and just clicking on the link helps to support The New EdTech Classroom!
Screenflow is a dynamic, intuitive video editing software that I use to create all of my YouTube videos. They’re currently offering a free trial! Get more details here.
I use Adobe Spark Post to design all of my YouTube thumbnails, as well as all my social media graphics. More information here.
If you’re interested in creating a website, these are a couple of programs I personally use and highly recommend: Bluehost is a web host that offers a professional platform for your website. You can check them out here.
Elementor is a powerful tool that helps with clean visual design for your website as well as marketing to further your website’s influence. More details here.
