Learning Activity @ CUHK

Podcasting

Podcasting

Description

“Podcasting” refers to the distribution of digital media files series, such as audio and video files, by a podcast creator over the Internet using Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds. Podcasts are medium that can be subscribed. Subscribers can transfer these files to their portable media players. A series or station of podcasts regularly updates itself and new media or information will reach electronic devices of its subscribers automatically. In the field of education, subscribers can be referred as students within a course or materials that are open for public access.

Implementation

The development of podcasts consists of 3 stages:

Production:

The first step to production requires creators to plan, organize, write and record content that they would like to present. Followed by, they have to edit the audio/video and compress them into the format of podcasts.

For any first episode of a series of podcasts, creators have to turn these files into RSS feed, which is a simple XML file. The feed should contain information about the file, including publishing dates, titles and descriptions.

For subsequent episodes, creators have to add in relevant information about the new episodes onto the existing RSS feed.

Publication:

Creators should upload audio/video files and their corresponding RSS feeds onto a web server. Creators should keep these files in a web server constantly. And they should place these files into servers that they can access as long as the series of podcasting last.

To advertise their podcasts, creators may put a link to the RSS feed onto their blogs, websites, etc.

Listeners add in these RSS feed to a podcast aggregator (e.g. iTunes, Juice, and Doppler) so as to keep up with any updates.

Delivery:

Podcast aggregator will download the most recent episodes with reference to the RSS feed. As most podcast aggregators are synchronized between handheld devices and personal computers, users can choose to listen to these podcasts on either type of device.

For more information, please refer to http://www.apple.com/itunes/podcasts/specs.html

Application and variation

Professors may create weekly podcasts with updated, background information and guidance for weekly activities such as brainstorming at the beginning of a class, lecture summaries and practical learning. Besides, podcasts can be tools for the practice of listening and problem solving skills. For instance, teachers may assign recordings of different problems encompassing a wide range of topics for students to listen via podcasts prior to a lecture. He or she may then proceed to discuss these problems with them in class.

Podcasts can be carried around and are useful in field trips. For example, teachers may ask their students to download a series of podcasts prior to a trip. Each of these podcasts corresponds with one of the places that students are going to visit. Students can refer to these podcasts for description of a place in detail or tasks they have to do if their teachers have assigned any.

Moreover, teachers may adopt this system to design new learning activities such as asking their students to produce news, stories, or even radio show via the system. Last but not least, podcasting provides a channel that facilitates the exchange of knowledge between teachers and students. In particular, teachers may record interviews or role-plays straddling a range of topics and personal experience to be shared with their students.

Extended reading
More information about field trips can be found on the papers and/or websites below:

Bull, P., Tyler, D., & Eaton, D. (2007). A neo-constructivist teaching tool: Perceptions of HBCU faculty to podcasting as a teaching and learning tool. In R. Carlsen et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference 2007 (pp. 1404–1409), Phoenix, Arizona, USA, 26–30 March.

McMinn, S.W.J. (2008). Podcasting possibilities: Increasing time and motivation in the language learning classroom.

In G. Avellis (Ed.), iLearning Forum 2008 (pp. 212-215). Paris: European Institute for E-Learning. CUHK teachers can click on the link below: http://www.eife-l.org/publications/proceedings/ilf08/contributions/improving-quality-of-learning-with-technologies/McMinn.pdf/at_download/file

Ideas:

Podcasts for pre and post lecture learning.
The teacher of SLW9620 (Principles of Land Law) adopted podcasting as a way to distribute learning resources for revision and review after class. To begin with, there was also a 5 minute podcast to introduce the course. Every week, there were three types of podcast. In the first type, he gave a 10-15 minutes summary of each lecture in order to help his students to get the main idea of the lecture in a short time. The second type consisted of full lectures for each week (sometimes broken into smaller segments). The third type was a collection of answers to problems or questions discussed in class which attempted to help students’ revision for the examination. Read more here.

Weekly podcasts for consolidation.
Professors may create weekly podcasts with updated, background information and guidance for weekly activities such as brainstorming at the beginning of a class, lecture summaries and practical learning. Besides, podcasts can be tools for the practice of listening and problem solving skills. For instance, teachers may assign recordings of different problems encompassing a wide range of topics for students to listen via podcasts prior to a lecture. He or she may then proceed to discuss these problems with them in class.

Podcasts in field trip setting.
Podcasts can be carried around and are useful in field trips. For example, teachers may ask their students to download a series of podcasts prior to a trip. Each of these podcasts corresponds with one of the places that students are going to visit. Students can refer to these podcasts for description of a place in detail or tasks they have to do if their teachers have assigned any.

Students’ creation of media.
Moreover, teachers may adopt this system to design new learning activities such as asking their students to produce news, stories, or even radio show via the system. Last but not least, podcasting provides a channel that facilitates the exchange of knowledge between teachers and students. In particular, teachers may record interviews or role-plays straddling a range of topics and personal experience to be shared with their students.

Viewing third-party podcasts.
It is not necessary to create your own podcasts. In fact, you can incorporate podcasts made by other people into your course of teaching. At the University of New England in 2006, 1,244 students in 6 law courses were invited to participate in using educational podcasting made by other people but not the teacher. 67% of students rated the use of podcasting as a tool for learning to be excellent and 14.7% rated that to be above average. CUHK teachers can click on the link below for more information:
http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/sydney06/proceeding/
pdf_papers/p132.pdf

Lecture recording for replay.
At University of Wyoming, podcast lectures were created for a General Microbiology class. 51 out of 75 students participated voluntarily to reveal their perceptions towards the use of podcast lectures. Around 77% of those who had used podcasting to replay lectures reported podcasting to be useful. More than 90% of them hoped that podcast lectures could be adopted on an on-going basis. CUHK teachers can click on the link below for more information: http://www.editlib.org/d/26677/

Podcasting for extending learning.
Besides, Northumbria University in the UK also adopted podcasting in providing additional material in computing module of the school of Computing, Engineering & Information Sciences (CEIS). CUHK teachers can click on the link below for more information:

http://www.academia.edu/5474950/Using_podcasts_in_higher_education

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