Product Review:
Ambrosia Software's Snapz Pro X
By Mitchell Levine
As the first generation of students to be raised with digital technology has
arisen, it's brought another new generation right along with it: the first
generation of teachers needing to teach digital technology to their classes.
Not everyone likes it, but it's a reality the education community as a whole
must come to terms with, whether the professionals charged with this task were
trained to adapt to it or not.
It stands to reason then that anything with the potential to not only help
students learn, but also to help teachers teach is going to be a valuable tool.
Well, one product that falls squarely in that category is Ambrosia Software's
Snapz Pro X. If there's one principle virtually everyone agrees on, it's that
most people learn more easily by watching than listening. And good teachers
know that instructing students via their preferred mode of understanding makes
teaching them basic skills a much smoother and rewarding process.
With Snapz Pro X, a parent or teacher can record
anything that happens on their Mac OS X-based computer's screen and save
it as a QuickTime video viewable on any other system with a QT player installed. "Training manuals" can
visually depict everything a student learning software like MS Word, Entourage,
Excel, or virtually anything else, should see as they progress through a lesson.
Teachers can lecture while the full motion video runs during class, or even
prerecord their commentary as a soundtrack. Of course, such videos aren't limited
to tutorials for applications: visual presentations of any kind can be "snapped" as
collages of web pages, documents, graphics, and high-quality digital audio.
Teachers with less than ideal experience with the
software on their classroom's syllabus can easily make professional looking
videos in their preparation time, eliminating the potential struggle demonstrating
on a computer "live" in
class often creates. Students will gain the benefits visual learning pathways
can offer. Plus, the QuickTime videos can be uploaded to a class site, allowing
students access to instruction anytime they need it from anywhere they can
connect to the Internet.
Snapz Pro X is definitely a utility you'll really need to use to appreciate
completely. Fortunately, a fully functional demo of the product is available
as a free time-limited download at the company's web domain. Log on to www.ambrosiasw.com for
more information and on-line ordering.#
