Task 3: Voice-to-Text

The Story (recording using Google Docs' "Voice-to-Text" feature)

The story I’m going to tell is about a heist. A liquor heist. Last summer we got married in August, and we had the wedding on our farm. Because it was the ultimate DIY wedding, we bought our own liquor from the BC liquor store. My friend and I picked up the liquor From the liquor store three days before the wedding. We loaded it onto a pallet in our driveway. My father-in-law, came and picked up the liquor with the skid steer and took it down to the barn where the wedding was going to be. That night, we were all at home. By all I mean my husband, friend and I. We were watching TV wearing a strange vehicle came up our road. Our road only has four houses on it and they are all family members. So it’s always weird when vehicles drive around on the road. Then my husband went down to speak to them and it was two young boys, they said they were lost. About half an hour later the same truck came up. This time we were a little concerned. my brother-in-law Scott said have you checked your food yet? So my husband went to check it and we were missing half a pallet of liquor! We were missing all of the beer and hard liquor. My husband said the kids had looked about 18, and because I’m a teacher I know all of the 18-year-olds in our town. So I reached out to the kidsI have contact with and located the truck. But no one would give me the name of the kid. I found a picture of the truck on Facebook, and recognize the houses and trees behind it. The house was in the same neighbourhood as the school I work at. So my friend and I have contact with and located the truck. But no one would give me the name of the kid. I found a picture of the truck on Facebook, and recognized the houses and trees behind it. The house was in the same neighbourhood as the school I work at. So my friend and I drove over there, and saw the truck in the driveway. At this point it was about 3 AM in the morning. And the cops didn’t start their shift until 8 AM. So we waited outside the kids house until he left for work in the morning. He works at a local construction equipment rental store which my husband goes to often. My husband went in and confronted the kid in front of all of the owners andEmployees. The kid agreed to go and get the liquor and give it back to us. By the time the cop showed up in the morning, we had already solve the crime and gotten the liquor back. The officer who responded to the case told my friend and I employees. The kid agreed to go and get the liquor and give it back to us. By the time the cop showed up in the morning, we had already solve the crime and gotten the liquor back. The officer who responded to the case told my friend and I that we are in the wrong careers and should be detectives.

Logistics

I told this story using the voice to text feature on a Google Doc. There are several students on IEP’s in my classroom who use this app for their written responses on assignments. I was already somewhat aware of the common frustrations that are often expressed to me. I have seen some students really struggle with the use of this app. One of my common suggestions is to think about what they want to say before they press record, and to go sentence by sentence. I didn’t take my own advice when recording my story. I chose to record it in long chunks, where I would speak until it cut me off. Then I would press the button and start again. In the end, I think this caused some miscommunication between my oral story and the transcribed story. I also used the microphone on my MacBook to record the story, where my students at school have special headphones with a mouthpiece (like the drive thru window at McDonalds!)

A Second Chance with a Scripted Story

If I would have had a chance to script the story, I would have ensured that the main points of my story were emphasized. This is a story that I’ve told numerous times… as it was a major event in the summer! When I tell it, I use a lot of exaggerated movements, facial expressions and changes in my voice. The story takes longer than 5 minutes to tell, with all of the details being expanded on. Therefore, I feel like the real thrill of the story isn’t captured by the voice-to-text synopsis shown here. I also would have slowed down and recorded the story in smaller chunks.

“Mistakes”

There are a variety of common mistakes within the text of my story. Some mistakes are quite simple and can be credited to the fact that I hadn’t spoken clear enough or pronociated the endings of my words. For example, I said “We were watching TV when a…” and it was transcribed as “We were watching TV wearing…” It also scribed “recognize” when I had used the past tense of “recognized”. In one section, I quote a question that my brother-in-law asked, but did not instruct the tool to put “quotation marks” around the sentence. This was an interesting error, because I was very cognizant to ensure that I said “comma” or “period” for this story.

Other mistakes can be contributed to errors in the transcribing tool itself. For example, halfway through my story, a section (2-3 sentences) gets repeated. I did not say this section of the story twice, however, it was transcribed twice. The same scenario happened at the very end of the story. In this instance, the first version of the text was actually incorrect - “the officer who responded to the case told my friend I employees.” Where the second instance showed what was actually said - “the officer who responded to the case told my friend and I that we are in the wrong careers and should be detectives.”

I suppose I consider these “mistakes” because they don’t agree with the conventional rules of written text. They are also not what the storyteller (myself) had intended to share, therefore change the dynamics of the story itself.

Oral Storytelling vs. Written Storytelling

The difference between oral storytelling and written storytelling was very evident when completing this assignment. Circling back to my previous comment above, the fact that I have told this story numerous times in the last year (probably at least 20 times), it’s safe to say that I’ve probably never told this story the same way twice. Oral storytelling is unscripted, and has a variety of expressions and hand gestures in order to emphasize certain parts of the story, to ensure the feelings of the characters are represented. Using these techniques allows the listener of the story to really visualize the experience of the characters (or in my case, the storyteller who was the character). Written storytelling does not capture the same essence as oral storytelling. Although one of my favourite writing lessons to teach is using “voice” in your writing, there are not very many authors who can write with the same “voice” or “expression” that is demonstrated in oral storytelling.

Writing Technologies

Haas states that, “Writing is made material through the use of technologies, and writing is technological in the sense and to the extent that it is material. Human beings have used and continue to use technologies (e.g., sticks on sand, pen and ink on parchment, #2 pencil on legal pad, cursor on monitor) to bring language to material life.” This statement really got me thinking. The term “technology” in 2019 usually refers to just that - technology. Computers, smart phones, tablets… “real” technology. The purpose of these technologies is “allow for the creation of the material artifacts that are named by the noun writing” (Haas, 2013). It doesn’t really matter whether the technology used is a stick in the wet sand, or a fancy new MacBook Pro - both allow the same purpose - to communicate thoughts via “writing”, materializing literacy. Returning to the notion of oral storytelling versus written storytelling, would the storytellers “voice” be a method of technology? It communicates thoughts, but doesn’t produce a material written product. Or does it? If an oral story is recorded on a piece of technology, whether it’s an old voice recorder or an app on your smartphone, does it then become a “written product”? The CBC article in module 3.1 discusses the importance of keeping Indigenous languages alive after elders pass away, preserving the language in a downloadable app for today’s students (2019). How can we turn oral stories, especially in Indigenous cultures, into materials that can be read or listened to for generations to come, without losing the “expression” or “magic” held within an oral story?

CBC Interview https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1473203779545/

Haas, C. (2013). “The Technology Question.” In Writing technology: Studies on the materiality of literacy. Routledge. (pp. 3-l).