Thing #17 Podcasting

I found myself very frustrated with podcasts.  Most of the podcasters used the beginning of each podcast to entertain and play around instead of actually getting to the subject at hand.  For instance Learn out Loud with Ray and Hollye had some terrible podcasts.  They had too much personal conversation irrellevent to the topic of teaching about technology.  I also realized that since I am a visual and auditory learner I couldn't have a copy of their podcast in front of me to look at or read so listening only I wasn't able to focus well on the podcast.  Students who are auditory would benefit from hearing the podcast.  ESL students would benefit from hearing and being able to read along with the podcast.  I wish that feature were available on all of the websites.  

Harry Henshaw’s Podcast (on Learn Out Loud)  of relaxing music was fantastic.  It was so good I subscribed to it in my Google Reader.  This podcast was downloaded to my ITunes and is going to be nice to listen to at bedtime or when I am working on an intense project or data.  I sent this to my teachers so they could play it during tests and as the students are entering/exiting the room to help them settle down to be prepared to learn.  

With NPR (National Public Radio) you are able to search by title, author, or provider.  I subscribed to a Jazz feed Tamir Hendelman Trio In Concert on JazzSet with Dee Dee Bridgewater.   I've been searching for more interesting radio podcasts to share with students and teachers as well.  What if students could use their cellphones or MP3 players to download these podcasts and appreciate the arts?  What if they learned to incorporate the music with the presentations they create?

Online Education Database (OEDb) is a great site for looking at the what, who, where of higher education.  There is even a tab for financial aid. This is a great resource for our middle and high school students to begin to learn about colleges and universities.  There is even a top ranking tab.

PBS kids offers a podcast called DragonFlyTV. This podcasting shows kids doing real Science and also has some vodcasts.  I watched/listened to an episode and the students are quite entertaining.  Our kiddos could create this themselves.  If they can talk/teach it, they have learned the content.

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Authors Tour Live. Lauren Weisberger used podcasting to read six minutes of her book:  Last Night at Chateau Marmont.  It was interesting, fun to hear the author’s tone and voice reading her own book.

Podcasting is a wonderful tool which allows students to hear the words from others and to use to create their own as an assessment to what they learned about a specific topic.