Monday, April 20, 2009

EDM 310 Podcasts

Our podcast project this semester was one that truly enlightened me. Not only did each of the podcasts I listed to enlighten me, but also the process of going through this project itself. I did not know what a podcast was before this semester, so this project opened my mind to what a great resource this could be in education and in any other workplace. The four podcasts I listened to were:
Access-Distant Learning in Alabama High Schools
Technology in the Classrooms at the University of South Alabama
EdTechTalk
Facebook: It's In Class! But Can it Be Useful In Class?
As a whole, these podcasts were educational and entertaining; however, there were some areas for improvement in each. One of the things I noticed in these podcasts was the rustle of papers in the background. I wasn't aware of how sensitive the microphone was when my group did our podcast, but this was an issue in our podcast and in others. This extra noise provides a distratction to the listener and should be avoided by keeping notes to a minimum of one page.
Another issue that I noticed in some of the podcasts were conversation fillers such as "um". These fillers put a break in the conversation and suggest that the topic is not well understood. In other words, these words sound unprofessional. These fillers can be avoided by practicing more and becoming more confident with the topic.
The last issue I noticed was the lack of conversation in some of the podcasts. I believe that conversation makes the podcasts easy to listen to and enjoy at the same time. There should never be one dominant speaker, instead, the whole group should be involved and create a story line with their conversation that provides as much information on the topic as possible.

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