Torbay RTC: Radio in Schools

Live blog from #torbayrtc

Radio in Schools is a commercial service that aggregates school podcasts and provides a range of tools and support to help schools create and distribute podcast. Links with Global Radio network and so schools can access their resources, it is linked to from their iTunes page and is listened to by Global DJs and staff. Includes online podcast creation tool. Also, loads of curricular material and information of how radio activities link to literacy curriculum.

Speaker has just shared that in commercial radio, news reports have to be delivered in three sentences. I can see that this allows pupils to develop useful summarising but I'm surprised at how brief it has to be in the real world. Three sentences to describe the war in Afghanistan!

Now talking about copyright issues. Global radio provided a lot of material for schools to use but they are working on a way to allow schools to share music etc. and assert the material can be shared. {Creative Commons would seem an obvious way to go but I wonder what their industry partners make of that? - DDM}

Staff, pupils and parents are all using the service.

An EdCompCast for EduTalk

I happened to notice a Twitter message on Monday announcing the arrival of EDUtalk. After the success of SLFtalk, John Johnston and David Noble decided to set up a more general site to provide a location for educators to post audio material to the web. They were aware that not everyone has the skills or the time to create a regular podcast, so they aimed to make it as easy as possible to get audio material on the web.

The Googly eyePod
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

EDUtalk is simply a website which gives as many ways as is sensibly possible to post audio. You can email directly to the site with an audio file as an attachment, or you can use one of a number of existing phone/audio blogging tools and EDUtalk will pick up your post and, after a moderation stage, post it on EDUtalk too.

As stated above, if you can create an mp3 on your computer, you will be able to email it to EDUtalk. Other ways to post to EDUtalk currently supported are:

• Gabcast
• AudioBoo
• iPhone Voice Memos
• Skype and Pamela
• MP3 player with built-in microphone
• iPadio for EDUtalk

During the launch FlashMeeting, David and John were asked why would someone, who could already post audio material on their own site, want to post to EDUtalk? Two possible reasons were given. The first reason was that it would increase the audience for the audio, which is probably true. However, I found the second reason more compelling: it gives a location where audio related to an event can be aggregated. Certainly, one of the reasons SLFtalk was such a success was that you could go to one location and access audio material from a range of contributors - much easier than chasing round umpteen blogs.

In theory, I have been meaning to produce more EdCompCasts for a while now but it's been about a year since I published the last one. I have material recorded that I meant to turn into a podcast but never got around to it. The launch of EDUtalk seemed like a good excuse to give it another go and, in the spirit of EDUtalk mobile audio blogging, do something quick and simple.

As it happened, I was going to talk to some Computing Science students at Glasgow University the day after EDUtalk's launch, so I decided to record some of their questions. Today I did a minimal edit, put a top and tail on it and saved it as an mp3 file. Here it is here as an EdCompCast:

EdCompCast09Eps01 - Questions from Computing Students

In a few moments I'll email it to EDUtalk and I'll update this post as soon as I see it's been moderated.

Since it's been a while since the last EdCompCast, I thought I'd remind you how to subscribe to the podcast. I've added a button to the sidebar (second from the bottom, below the Subscribe To section which is intended for the text posts on this blog). You should see a link to iTunes that will add EdCompCast as a subscription for you.

Remember to answer the students' questions as well as letting me know what you think of EDUtalk.

Update: The audio from this post is now live on EDUtalk.

Podcasting as a new educational means (#ecer2009)

Live blog captured during presentation by Raphael Struck, Heikki Kynäslahti*, Olli Vesterinen and Seppo Tella from University of Helsinki, Finland.

Podcasting as a new educational means — Students as content producers

Investigated mobile learning in the 1990s - using mobile devices to collect and transfer information. Also interested in student's pedagogical thinking (a new area of study) that becomes more important in Web 2.0 and user created content.

Comes from research on pedagogical thinking which considers that something has to sit between teaching and learning - studying. The student's pedagogical thinking supports their studying.

Worked with media education students who made podcasts in groups on a topic of their choice from the module they were studying. Research looked at what they learned while creating their podcast rather than what they learned from listening to others. They developed a number of skills: they developed pedagogical thinking, learned to express themselves in a concise manner and developed technical skills.

Mobility was not as great as expected - in general they created the podcast on a computer rather than a mobile device. However attitudes to mobile methods, especially listening, were positive.

The researcher considered where conflicts may arise. For example, if a student's pedagogical thinking considers the use of ICT to be important but teachers do not require it, there could be conflict.

The researchers think they could have explained why the podcasts were to be created and the students found it frustrating that nobody listend to their podcasts.

Another podcast... and an explanation

There are some courses that I enjoy teaching, and the BEd 4 Computers, Creativity and Education class is one that I really enjoy. We talk about a whole bucket load of interesting stuff, for example: Telling Tales with Flickr.

Podcast Bear
Originally uploaded by blogefl

The classes tend to follow the same basic pattern. First we'll introduce the technology/tool and talk about it's value to education. In the podcasting class we talked about:

• telling stories
• giving children a voice
• using the technology pupils use
• giving children a (worldwide) audience
• encouraging co-operation
• supporting diverse learning styles
  
• allowing pupils to receive feedback from a variety of sources
• children staying on task and setting themselves high expectations

Then we let them hear some of the Radio Sandaig podcasts. {I think it's important to let theme hear pupil voices and pupil produced podcasts. In Higher Education, it seems people are pleased with themselves when they podcast an hour long lecture! I want students to see the pupils as creators, not just consumers of podcasts.} We also share my podcast related delicious links. {I think I need to categorise or prune that list. Too much stuff all mixed up together!}

This was followed by a brief demonstration of Garageband (about ten minutes) which left just over half an hour for them to produce their own podcast. They were divided into groups of two or three and assigned a topic at random from things we had already studied. {I used the Random Name Picker tool to assign topics - thanks to Ewan and TeachMeet for introducing me to this brilliant tool.}

I've already posted Cheryl and Gill's podcast in Podcast from BEd class. Here's another one, this time by Amy Linzi and Ailie. It is about delicious and the usefulness of online bookmarks:

Online Bookmarks

I especially like the sung version of the delicious URL at the end! What do you think? What advice should I give the students to help them improve their podcasts? What other podcasts should they listen to? Can you suggest ways they can use podcasts in their classes?

Podcast from BEd class

The BEd 4 Computers, Creativity and Education class created podcasts today. Here's one by Gill and Cheryl about Digital Video in the classroom.

Pretty good for only ten minutes tuition on GarageBand and 30 minutes to record.

Digital Video Podcast

ECER 2008 - Podcasting and Blogging – the way to learn

Live blog from a session at ECER 2008.

Report on study from Mid Sweeden University by Maria Rasmusson, Susanne Sahlin and Marcus Sundgren

Student attitudes to podcasts and blogs. Report on an ICT And New Media As Support for Learning course for student teachers.

Podcasts were recorded lectures and were about 30 minutes long but students were expected to use their own blog and were assigned to write posts and comment on each others work. Students were “proficient to average computer users”.

Students reacted positively to the podcasts and comments included “Listening is better than reading” and saw them as an alternative or complement to lectures. Negative comments made were mostly around technical issues but some did say it was a “limited experience compared to traditional lecture”.

Blogs were very positively rated (85.7% thought it supported their learning). They appreciated the sense of writing for an audience. The blogs were public so writing for an audience beyond their tutors and peers. Some saw the potential as a tool in their own teaching practice. There were no real technical problems with the blog but a few expressed concern that the objectives of the blogging exercise were unclear.

The students valued the podcast and blogs as tools for their own learning.

My comments: In the question and answer session the presentrs talked about the entusiasm the students had for using blogs and wikis (but not really podcasts) in their classrooms. Perhaps the recorded lecture format did not show the real potential of podcasting. However, where the students benefited from the tools (blogs and wikis) they saw the potential. If I want my student teachers to be blogging teachers I need to encourage them to be blogging students. Better telt than felt!