My New Favorite Teaching Hack (Voice Memos!)

Tired of repeating yourself a hundred times a day? I’ve got a teaching hack that’s going to save your voice and keep your classroom running smoothly! 

If you hear yourself saying, “Sit down!” one hundred times a day, let me introduce you to your new favorite teaching hack: voice memos. Voice memos are the perfect, easy way to streamline daily routines and improve classroom management.

Why did you decide to use voice memos as a teaching hack?

I’ll be honest with you – the idea to use voice memos in my classroom was born from feeling like I constantly repeated myself all day. 

My classroom is big, there are a lot of bodies moving around, and I felt like my students at the back of the class couldn’t hear a word that I was saying. 

So, I started recording the common things that I was saying: classroom callbacks, directions, and behavior reminders in the voice memo app on my phone. Then I connected my phone to a Bluetooth speaker, and voila!, everyone in the class could hear me. And did I mention that I wasn’t using my voice all day every day!? 

Using voice memos as a teaching hack has made everything so much easier for me. I can’t wait to clue you in on how to use this secret teaching hack in your classroom!

How to get started using voice memos as a teaching hack?

It’s super easy to get started with this exciting teaching hack. You just need the “Voice Memo” or “Voice Recorder” app on your phone (most iPhones and Androids should have this app already downloaded).

I keep the app on my homepage so that it’s easy for me to access throughout the school day. The drafts automatically save inside the app. It’s simple to rename each voice memo so that I know which recording to play and when. When I was recording, I made sure that I recorded them using a calm, flight-attendant-like voice. 

If you aren’t quite sure what types of voice memos you may want to use in your classroom, I share 10 ideas below.

10 Ways to Use Voice Memos in Your Classroom

1. Daily announcements:

Use voice memos to share the daily announcements that you need to share with your classroom. Think: reminders about upcoming deadlines, school fundraisers, student birthdays, project reminders, and more.

2. Classroom callbacks:

Classroom callbacks are a great way to get your students on task. Some of my favorites are

Teacher: “Hocus Pocus”
Students: “Everybody focus”

Teacher: “If you can hear me, clap once”

Teacher: ”If you can hear me, clap twice” 

Instead of trying to yell these classroom callbacks over your noisy students, use your speaker to play the pre-recorded classroom callback on your voice memo app.

3. Transition Reminders

I often use a countdown from 10 to 1 to help my students wrap up what they are doing and transition to the next task. I have a voice memo with this countdown already created in my phone ready to go. Another transition idea is to record yourself saying

Teacher: “Clean up, clean up”
Students: “Everybody do your share”

After students hear the transition reminders, they clean up or transition to their next space.

4. Grouping students:

Voice memos are also a great way to group students for a task such as grabbing snack, lining up, etc. I have voice memos recorded to send students by shirt color or birthday month to complete a task.

5. Countdown timers:

You can also use a voice memo as a timer. Just start your voice memo with the total number of minutes, then a reminder as you reach each new minute, and finally, a countdown from 10 to 1 for the last ten seconds of the timer.

6. Positive reinforcement:

Having positive praise recorded shows your students that voice memos aren’t always for reinforcing rules. Record things like, “I’m so proud of my class” or “You guys are amazing” to mix it up.

7. Quiet signals:

Use a bell for a quiet sound or a quiet signal such as voice levels.  Level 0 reminders for staying silent, level 1 for whisper, etc.

8. Start and end of day rituals:

You could record a voice memo with your morning announcements, what’s for lunch, etc. as well as your start and end of day rituals. Instead of just listing these tasks on the board, you can record them for your students to listen to while limiting your need to yell instructions.

9. Instructions for Independent Work

You can use voice memos to remind your students of any directions that they will need for independent work. This is great for helping students who are off-task. All you need to do is play the voice memo again and ask students if they are following instructions.

10. Behavioral Reminders

Having behavior reminders like “Remember we raise our hands to speak,” “Voice level zero,” and any other behavioral expectation for your class already recorded allows you to just press a button and let your students know of your expectations throughout the day. This is especially helpful with voice levels. 

Voice memos are truly my new favorite teaching hack. They have been a game changer in getting students’ attention, reducing strain on my voice, saving time, and maintaining order in my classroom. I’ve also felt less stressed and less moody because it feels like I’m simply facilitating learning and not trying to talk over my students all day. It’s been a total relief. 

I know that I just shared a whole list of ways to use voice memos, but here are a couple more because I’m just so excited about this amazing teacher hack! Here’s a quick recap:

1. Daily announcements
2. Classroom callbacks
3. Transition reminders
4. Grouping students
5. Countdown timers
6. Positive reinforcement
7. Quiet signals
8. Start and end of day rituals
9. Instructions for activities
10. Behavioral reminders. 

A Couple More Ways to Use Voice Memos

Use voice memos for sounds: Consider recording a bell sound or another sound to help get your students’ attention. Not all voice memos have to include you talking.

Let your students join in: Allow your students to record voice memos too. You can allow them to read the rules, what they should do for Daily 5, and more. Doing this helps build classroom community, asks your students to take ownership of their learning, and allows them to hear a voice other than yours.

Adding voice memos and a Bluetooth speaker to your classroom routine is going to make everything run more smoothly as you solidify rules and procedures for the rest of the school year. Trust me on this! 

Are you ready to start using this new teaching hack? Let me know in the comments what voice memos you are going to add to your classroom this school year!

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