Hayley’s Blog

After reading Cathie’s article ‘without pen and paper’ it made me think into how we learnt before pen and paper where invented, surely their were just as many valid resources out there to assist student learning which proves that technology is not a new implementation in our classrooms, after all I’m sure the pen was an amazing invention back in the day. The main point of inventing technology is to make things simpler for us and to let us have fun. These are two very important things for our teaching after all we do want our children to learn as much as possible under our care, so why wouldn’t we use new technologies that allow us to make learning easier and more fun for them?

An example of how technology can make a task generally perceived as boring, more interesting is the use of podcasts for students to make speeches where they can edit their voices and add sound effects. They get their idea’s across whilst making it fun with their own touch of character.

After creating my first podcast a week ago, I got to experience that feeling of satisfaction due to what I had achieved. I then became intrigued as, if a podcast made me feel proud, what could it bring to my classroom? After reading the journal article How to use Podcasts at your school I have learnt that as an educator it allows me to record my lessons, assemblies and board meetings for students and parents to listen to as they please.

More importantly for my students it could open a whole new world for them to express themselves. Podcasts allow student’s to record their voices and add music to make it more fun to listen to, and reflect on their learning. After reading this article I am beginning to wonder whether the 21st century podcast will replace the frightening oral speech? After all it would still be expressing student’s feelings and ability to communicate through language, just without the threat of thirty staring eyes. It would also give all student’s an equal opportunity as those who are confident public speakers won’t have such an advantage over those who tend to be more shy, as they won’t be standing in front of a group of people. In this advancing technological world will the podcast be the new oral speech with a creative twist?