Add Voice Notes to Your Email With Mote

Last month I featured a new Chrome extension called Mote. Mote lets you add voice comments to Google Classroom, Slides, and Docs. As of yesterday it lets you add voice comments to Gmail messages. 

If you already have Mote installed in your Chrome web browser you should already have access to using Mote in your Gmail. (You might have to relaunch Chrome and approve Mote for it appear in Gmail). When you compose an email in Gmail you should see the Mote icon appear in the menu next to the "send" button. Click the Mote icon to record a message and have it automatically inserted into the email you're composing. 

Mote recordings in Gmail can be played by anyone who receives your email. Recipients don't need the Mote extension in order to hear your message. Recipients who do have Mote installed will be able to reply to your voice message with voice messages of their own. 

📢 HUGE UPDATE 📢

Teachers: it would be awesome if it were possible to record voice notes directly into emails 🙏
Us: we're launching Mote for Gmail! 📨

To access: update our extension to the latest version... available on the Chrome Web Store now! 💜🚀 pic.twitter.com/52MDaJAjbi

— mote (@justmoteHQ) February 22, 2021

Applications for Education

For some people recording a voice note might be a quicker way to respond to students' email messages. I like the voice option because it provides an easy way to use inflection and tone when giving students feedback on their work or when responding to their questions. 

How to Quickly Record Audio in Google Slides, Docs, and Classroom

Last week I wrote a short overview of a new Chrome extension called Mote. In that blog post I focused just on the aspect of Mote that lets you record audio in Google Slides. As a slew of people mentioned to me in emails over the weekend, Mote can be used for more than just adding audio to Google Slides. 

Mote is a Chrome extension that can be used to record audio to insert into Google Slides, into Google Documents, and into Google Classroom. In the following videos I provide demonstrations of how to use Mote in all three of those G Suite tools. 

Installing Mote & Using it Google Slides

In this video I demonstrate how to install Mote and how to activate it in your Google account. 

How to record audio in Google Docs.



How to record audio in Google Classroom.

Mote - An Easier Way to Add Audio to Google Slides

Mote is a new Chrome extension that I learned about from one of Greg Kulowiec's Tweets earlier this week. With Mote installed in your Chrome web browser you can quickly record audio and have it inserted into your Google Slides with just one click. 

To use Mote in Google Slides you first have to install the Chrome extension. Once you've installed the Chrome extension you'll then see a Mote icon near the "Present" button in your Google Slides editor. Click that icon to start recording. The free version of Mote lets you record for thirty seconds. After you stop recording you can then play it back. If you like your recording, just click the insert button on the Mote menu to have it added to your slide. If you don't like your recording, just hit the trash icon and try again. 

The first time that you use Mote you will have to grant it access to your Google account. That access will include accessing your Google Drive. That access is necessary because the way that Google Slides handles audio is by playing it back from audio files that are stored in your Google Drive. It's for that reason that you'll find your Mote audio recordings are stored in your Google Drive account. 

Just like inserting any other audio in Google Slides, Mote audio recordings can be set to playback automatically when you are presenting. You can also set the recording to play on a loop. More details about adjust audio playback in Google Slides is available here. 

Applications for Education
Mote could make it a lot easier for teachers and students to add explanatory audio to Google Slides. Just remember that if you're going to share your slides with students, you'll need to change the access settings for the audio file in Google Drive to "anyone with the link can access" otherwise they won't be able to hear your audio file. I explain and demonstrate that setting in the last portion of the video (about the 3:10 mark) that is embedded above.