Blog Post #4

I loved the post Langwitches - Flat Stanley Podcast. I love the way she made the students choose a location and research it. The students were learning many different subjects at the same time. The students made their own Flat Stanley and mailed him to relatives or friends in the location they chose. The students were required to research many aspects of the location they chose. They had to decide how they arrived at the location. They had to decide what they did while they were there and how they came back home. They had to come up with things to do that were at that location. The students were creating an audio recording so they were required to think about the senses used while there also. I enjoyed reading about this project. This is something that I would like to do with my students. I feel that this would be very interesting to the students and when they are interested then they learn more.

Langwitches - Podcasting with 1st Grade was very interesting. I am eager to have my own classroom. I am excited that first graders are learning how to do these things. The students had watched podcast from a second grade class. They were amazed at all of the comments from around the world that it received. They were then eager to do one themselves. The teacher read them a book and the students had to act as if they were interviewing two of the main characters. The students were using many skills. They were listening, speaking, presenting, and using comprehension just to name a few. The students were more excited about hearing themselves on the web than anything. They wanted to listen to it over and over.

The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom by Joe Dale was also very interesting. The students are able to be more creative in my opinion. Students today are aware of computers and the internet and things like this are normal for them. When I was a child we didn’t have things like this but kids today use computers on a daily basis. My children Skype often with my dad while he is away working in Canada. Podcasting makes it easy for parents to see what their child is learning in school. The students are usually very proud to show their parents what they do. This is a way that students can show everyone their work even if a parent or relative lives out of town. I definitely will be using podcasting in my future classroom.