Blog Post Assignment #5

Langwitches, Podcasting with 1st Grade

In the blog, Podcasting with 1st Grade, she let the class listen in on what some students in the second grade did with their podcast. A lot of the students took great interest in what they had done. So they decide as a class that they wanted to do their own podcast. One of the reasons they gave was because the students wanted to get their "own voices in someone else's computer or ipod." I think that it is great that first graders are so interested in the technology that is out there. She goes on to describe the process that she took to create the podcast with the students. The students had a lot of input into what the script would like. She goes on to tell that the students that were shy came out of their shell, and that she was amazed at how cooperative and attentive they were while doing the podcast. Some of the skills that they learned while doing the podcast was listening, speaking, presenting, voice acting, comprehension, and more. After reading this blog, I was amazed at how first graders can accomplish such a big task. So I said to myself that if they can do it, then surely college age students can most certainly figure out and should know how to do it.

Langwitches, Flat Stanley Podcast

In the blog, Flat Stanley Podcast, another first grade class got inspired by their fellow first grade classmates that they too wanted to create their own podcast. So the teacher gave them an assignment to do for their podcast. So to start the assignment they took the book they were reading, Flat Stanley by Jim Brown, and sent paper copies to their relatives and friends around the country and received feedback and stories. So as a class they decided to brainstorm some ideas about what they wanted to put into they podcast. Their homework was to pick a location and borrow a book from the library or research that location on the internet, and they were to include:

The location (City, State, Country, and/or Continent)
How did they get there (transportation)?
What did they do at that location?
How did they get back home?

They were also given a reminder that this was an audio recording and they needed to be thinking about what sound effects that they were going to need to make the story come alive.

The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom

In the video, The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom, it discusses the benefits of podcasting within the classroom. Podcasting enhances the students ability to learn, and comprehend the lesson given to them. It also allows for students that have been out sick for a while to stay on top of their studies and not have so much work to make up when they do return to school. I know going throughout my college career that I have be sick for a couple of days and it is hard to try and keep up in the class when you have missed vital information during those days that I was out. Podcasting in the classroom focuses on the Bloom's Taxonomy, which allows for more creativity and innovation. Podcasting is easy to upload the internet, and allows the student and parents to listen in on what is going on within the classroom. In the video the ask the students what they think about podcasts. The students say that they enjoy the podcast because it the sound effects bring the stories to life, parents like it because they know that the children aren't always listening to just music.