Mix it up: Jocko Mixing Booth gives students a voice

ARLEE — The Arlee Warriors blazed their way through the state

tournament this year and they’re also blazing a trail in multimedia

with the new Jocko Mixing Booth.

ARLEE — The Arlee Warriors blazed their

way through the state tournament this year and they’re also blazing

a trail in multimedia with the new Jocko Mixing Booth.

Arlee teacher, Anna Baldwin came up

with the idea for the high-tech mixing booth after using audio

elements in her class assignments.

“I wanted to try news things and

podcasts seemed like an easy and applicable thing to try,” Baldwin

said. “I had a little cheap microphone in the classroom but it was

awkward and it didn’t work very well.”

Baldwin thought that it might work

better if the students had their own space to work, such as a

recording booth. That way, the students weren’t recording projects

in the midst of a chaotic classroom.

She wanted to have kids work on

NPR-like news stories, book reviews, public service announcements,

radio shows, audio slideshows, and she wanted the students to have

a workspace for it. That’s when Arlee technology specialist

Michelle Wieler suggested applying for a grant through the Plum

Creek Foundation.

“I thought that it would be great for

it to have its own separate location,” Baldwin said.

Plum Creek is the largest private

landowner in the country. It manages timberlands with sustainable

forestry practices and sells timber products to customers

throughout the United States. The Plum Creek Foundation was founded

to improve the quality of life in communities where the company’s

employees live and work, and it provided almost $800,000 to

communities around the country in 2009.

Baldwin proposed that the Jocko Mixing

Booth would allow “the development of listening, speaking, reading

and writing skills, as well as the nurturing of creative logical

and critical thinking and effective media use.” She went on to

state that the Jocko Mixing Booth would become a regular part of

curriculum in her class.

Baldwin asked for $2,235 in grant money

for the recording booth equipment, that included a recording

computer, a recording/podcasting pack, headphones, a portable

recorder, software, seating in the booth and an iTunes account for

background music in the projects.

After applying in June, Baldwin

received the grant in August and had the booth set up by the end of

October.

There was plenty of work to be done as

the computer had to be built, the equipment had to be ordered and

the booth needed a home. Baldwin found the perfect home for her new

endeavor next door to her classroom, in the book closet. With the

insulating cinder blocks, she found that the closet was

exceptionally good at keeping the sound out.

Then, came the most important part: the

on-air sign.

Baldwin asked her stepfather Michael

Malloch if he could come up with one.

“He couldn’t find one so he decided to

build one,” she said. “I know he enjoys projects like that.”

Using donated plexi-glass, Malloch

crafted an LED on-air sign that now alerts outsiders that recording

is in progress inside the booth.

With the booth complete, students in

Baldwin’s classes (and the entire school) can use it for various

audio projects.

Baldwin’s students have done

interviews, investigative audio stories, audio slide shows and

op-ed pieces on how they think the media handled Hurricane Katrina.

She also had students take a look at old Montana history books.

“It was full of misinformation and

stunning statements,” Baldwin said.

She had the students voice their

opinions and talk about how they would revise the textbooks.

Baldwin also plans to have them work on

a social action project where students will lay out a solution for

a problem faced by our society. In all, she has created another

avenue for students to express themselves in the digital era.

“It’s an authentic product that is a

representation of their beliefs, thoughts and ideas,” Baldwin

said.

Unlike an assignment where students are

expected to give a certain answer in a certain way, the Jocko

Mixing Booth allows the students to voice their opinions through

thought-provoking dialogue.

Baldwin, who is also the advisor for

the Arlee student newspaper, The Jocko, now has another form of

media that her students can use in the classroom.

And like a Kasey Bridgewater

three-pointer, this mixing booth is most certainly on target.