Why podcast in education

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Privacy Policy. Ever since my 5-year-old daughter learned the advanced functions on the remote control, she intentionally puts closed captions on her cartoons. My students—particularly those who are learning English as a second language—enjoy a similar motivation to master new words, albeit at a much higher level. And the subtitles have acted as a catalyst to quadruple the rate at which completely illiterate adults become proficient readers. Two years ago, my English department worked for months to convince the district to buy hundreds of copies of a nonfiction anthology for tens of thousands of dollars.

When I showed Twelve Angry Men and even an episode of Making a Murderer which has some subtitles to my criminal-justice class, they were visibly nonplussed, and openly asked for a return to something like Serial.

Again, this could be expected. One, from my experience there are few things more soporific to a teenager than listening to a singular narrator read a classically told story. Even an Edgar Allan Poe tale near Halloween fails to captivate, which used to surprise me.

And while entertainment writers are gushing about podcasts, educational scholars are excited about the latest findings concerning listening comprehension—and its correlation with literacy. In short, word recognition, or decoding, is the most crucial skill for very young or beginning students of English, but as decoding becomes more automatized and texts become more complex, listening comprehension becomes the primary component for learning language.

For a generation well versed in handling technology, downloading podcasts requires only basic technical knowledge and skills. Staff can record their classes and upload it online, creating an archive of lessons. This allows students to access previous lectures for reference and clarification on a subject or to stimulate learning of the same.

This can also be a boon for students who choose to miss the lesson as they can access the information directly without depending on others. Similarly, if a teacher misses a class, they can post the lesson online and make it available to the students. Students subscribing to a particular podcast will be notified if there is an update. A major advantage of podcasting is that student who have subscribed will be sent information constantly, unlike a virtual learning environment in which students have to be motivated to visit the site.

Thus podcasting enables easy sharing of information to all its members. With podcasting, learning is no longer a sedentary activity. As every lesson can be downloaded on their iPod or MP3 player, students can attend to it even when they are away from their study table.

Learning can occur even when a child is mowing the lawn or while lying on their bed. It stimulates different types of learners as students can learn visually through videos and PDFs, auditory through audio clips, and also by doing it physically. Thus students are motivated to learn and excel. Unlike the traditional pedagogic strategies, podcasting gives way to new strategies like guest lectures, interviews, video demonstrations, etc.

Podcasts make it easier for students to catch-up Missing classes can be stressful and demotivating. Start Your Free Trial! Create Account. Screens grab attention, audio holds it Podcasts can also make teaching more accessible.

Podcasts help accommodate all learning styles Different people prefer different styles of learning, so variety is key if you want to engage all your students. Podcasts are the perfect revision tool Podcasts are a wonderful revision tool to go over past material. USB microphones aren't expensive Podcasting also makes it easier to work from home as a teacher.

Set existing podcasts to listen to There are loads of podcasts already out there, so why not take advantage? Entertaining AND Educational 2. Repurpose lectures as podcasts Most classes already use lectures as part of their teaching methods.

Record conversations with others Adding another person to your podcast is an easy way to keep it entertaining. Use storytelling in your podcasts Podcasts are an amazing medium for storytelling , and the genre is growing massively. Get students to make their own podcasts Teachers are always looking for new projects to set.

Podcasts as a group learning activity Giving students projects to work on together is more important than ever right now. Conclusion So there you have it, 5 ways to start including podcasts in your teaching. Enrol Now. Join the conversation. Recommended Articles:. Podcasting news and insights. Thanks for subscribing! We've just sent you an email, please follow the instructions to confirm your details.

Start Your Podcast Today Ready to turbocharge your podcast? Create Your Account Free 14 day trial. Oops, something went wrong. If you already have an account sign in. If not, please try again. There was an error with the validation. Please try again later! Almost there! We've sent you an email. Please click the link to activate your account. Have multiple podcasts or need lots of users?

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