Tool: Incredibox for Schools
It’s true! Incredibox - a longtime favorite of thousands of music educators and their students - has recently released Incredibox for Schools - built specifically for teachers to use with their students. This education version has a few BIG differences, including the ability to create classes, add students for a secure and private login, have students save their work for teachers to review, access to all 9 of the arrangements, they no longer have exposed nipples, and most importantly - it is NOT free. 100 students will cost you $345.60. Is it worth it? Let’s see…
If you are familiar with the free version of Incredibox, you pretty much already know how it works. When you launch any of the 9 arrangements, you are met with 7 blinking hipsters. The free version has them appear shirtless - which for some reason makes some teachers uncomfortable. Beneath the hipsters are 16 items of clothing, including hats, masks, glasses, and headphones. All you need to do is drag any item to any hipster, and they will start to beatbox or sing. Students LOVE it. For a full description from a previous blog post on Incredibox, click HERE.
So how does the education version differ from the free version? Here are a few important features:
Teachers can create Classrooms. This is a great way to organize your students and keep track of their work in Incredibox. There is no limit to the number of classrooms you can create. Super useful.
Teachers can Add Students to their Classrooms. Simply type in the names of the students and then click on Download Login Instructions. The teacher can then print out the PDF and distribute to the students. HERE is an example of what those instructions look like.
Once you have your students in your classroom, you can manage them in several ways. You can edit their information, switch the classes that they are in, lock their information, or remove them from the class. You also get a Mixes column that allows you to see and hear any student work.
With an education account, the students (and the teacher) can access all 9 arrangements. While this may not seem that important, it certainly extends the amount of time and engagement that students will have using the software.
No more nipples! I personally think that the resistance to using Incredibox because the hipsters have black dots to represent their nipples is crazy, but someone must have told Incredibox, because now they all appear in tank tops to start :)
Pricing plans start at $22.80 for 50 students to be able to access the education version for 1 month. 100 students for one year of access is $345.60. A 6 month subscription is $201.60. I’m not quite sure how that pricing will fly - especially when you can get many other online software programs that do quite a bit more for less. It all depends on HOW you plan on incorporating it.
So WHY would anyone want to PAY for a website that has always been free? Good question. For me, the biggest advantage of the education version is the ability to see and hear student work in one centralized location. They do not have assignment functionality yet - and hopefully that is coming soon as it would be a big plus.
My suggestion to all music educators who have used Incredibox in the past as well as those who haven’t, is to sign up for a FREE 10-day trial and see whether the education version is something that your school might pay for.
Do you have the education version at your school? Let me know how it’s going!