Podcast Newbie : )
Podcasting was something totally new for me before starting this course. I honestly didn't understand how to do a podcast and I didn't understand the purpose. The more research I did, the more I learned. I was most interested in how this could benefit teachers and media specialist.What is Podcasting?
Well don't laugh, but the first thing I realized is that you don't have to have a ipod to do a podcast! Second of all podcasting is simple an audio file that people can download and listen to. This is usually done when someone wants to share an idea or something else that maybe useful to the public.How can Podcasting be used in the media center?
The first thing that I came across was huge for me. Each morning at my school, as the media specialist I am in charge of morning announcements. Typically two to three students come to the media center and I film them live as they announce the news. Some days for whatever reasons, I may have a difficult time getting students to the news studio in time for the show. I thought about how podcasting could help me. During the week at sometime I could record the announcements that need to be heard each morning and then I could play them without the students needing to be there each morning. I could take one day, the week prior, record the news for Monday through Friday and then play it via the broadcasting system. The news format of how we do the morning show does not change; the only thing that really changes is announcements that teachers and students may want to share. I would take some time to prep, but in the end it would be an easy fix to the morning show. Students wouldn't have to worry about missing the first few minutes of class or worry that they can't make it to the newsroom in time. It definitely would be easy for me to hit the play button and have things already done.I also recall a time when I was teaching and not in the library, we had an author to come and read and speak to some of our students. We would have liked for the author to speak to the entire school, but there wasn't anyway we could make this happen. It would have been nice to create a podcast that we could have made available online on our school website for teachers to share with their classrooms or with those that didn't get to attend the assemble. Podcasting is great for recording guest speakers and then sharing them with the whole school.
One final thing that I thought of that would be of use to me in my media center is having students create and share their own stories. One day I had a student who took a picture book and looked at it and then told me that there were no words so he couldn't read it. I was shocked at first, but then I had to think that this was an elementary aged student who really probably had not been exposed to picture books and the beauty of them. I came from a background of working with middle school students and by then they had learned about picture books. I just thought that if I used podcasting, I could show students how to make those pictures come to life! They could actually take a picture book and add words to them creating a story. Then we could film the book and have audio of the child reading and sharing his/her story as they show the book. This is an activity that could be used during story time. Instead of me just reading a story, I could share some of the creations from other students in their school. I have not become a podcast lover and can't wait to bring it alive in my media center:)
Trona,
ReplyDeleteI am also pretty new to podcasting. I know it has been around for several years. I feel like it was more widely popular back in 2008 and 2009 than it is now, though I am not sure why. I think podcasting has a lot of potential for use in education, though. It would be great if it were more widely used in schools. It’s such an easy, cheap way to communicate and to get students involved in their education.
I also think podcasting has a great many potential uses in the media center. I liked your idea of using podcasts to record guest speakers for teachers and students who couldn’t make it to the live event. I think that’s a great way of allowing everyone in the school to be involved in an event they might have otherwise missed out on. I think I might also use the technology to create booktalks to promote new books in the library. The booktalks could be placed on the website for students to view.
Podcasting could also be used for media center orientations, to give a refresher to students on Dewey Decimal, and as you also mentioned, for morning announcements. I think your idea of recording the bulk of the announcements on one day of the week is a good idea, especially if the majority of the announcements stay the same through the week.
I also liked your idea of having students use the technology. This is a great way to promote some of the AASL standards, as well as the ISTE NETS. It’s also a good way to get students interested in the media center. Students like to use technology and they like to know their opinions matter. That’s why I would probably use podcasting in my media center as a way for students to create book reviews to share with each other on the media center website. I would also let them review movies if they chose to. Another thing I might use podcasting for is to create audio book versions of materials that are currently in the public domain, similar to what LibriVox does. It could be a good way for students who are involved in service organizations, such as Beta Club or National Honors Society, to get community service hours. It could also be used as an alternative to fines when students have books that are late. Best of all, it would add new items to the media center collection for patrons to use.