Attack of the Pod People- Podcast People!

As educators we are guarenteed to repeat ourselves over and again.  Not only that we get tired of saying teh same thing over and over.  Especially when reading things aloud to our classes.  I myself began reading The Outsiders to my ELAR classes.  Before I knew it I had lost my voice before 6th period.  Thankful the library had a play away version so my lessons were saved.  But what if there isn't an audio version readily available?  For you non- English folks how nice would it be if your students could listen to you going over the Pythagorean Theorem step by step from their home while doing homework?  Educators could just want to get students' mouths watering with a taste of what's to come.  That is where Podcasts come in handy!

For the tech noobs out there a podcast is a short (sometimes not quite so short) audio recording that is then uploaded to a website.  After doing a little research here are a very few things I found teachers using podcasts for:
   Short (2 minutes or less) book summaries.
   Daily Vocabulary
   Internet Safety
   Step by step instructions- usually dealing with computers
   Class routines- thinking of stealing this idea
   Learning a new language - will be learning Italian after this post.
   Communicate with Parents
   School Happenings
   Student Projects

There are of course million more ways to use a podcast in class, but I have neither the time nor memory space on my free blog to list the all.

So you want to make your own?  Lucky for us there are free programs to do just that.  A few are Audio Boom, Sound Cloud, Podomatic, and Garage Band (MAC products only).  Excluding Garage Band (I'm a PC), I gave the other three a go.
Here are my findings:

Sound Cloud- Brownie points for this program.  When I went to the Explore tab it led me to a place where I could listen to a U2 interview which led to 15 minutes of distraction and bliss.  Sweet! But I digress.  If you want nothing more than to check out interviews, music, and podcasts of others then Sound Cloud is the place to be. There is a lot to choose from music wise.  The selection of podcasts from authors and book talks are also pretty expansive.  When you find podcasts you like you can add them to your playlist or even re-post them.  When adding your own podcasts you can record one using the site or upload a previously recorded version.  Both are easy to do.

Audio Boom-  Very similar to Sound Cloud  when it comes to finding other pod casts to look for.  The search feature is easy enough to use as is the ability to record or upload your own.  This site did not allow me to explore it without signing up which was kind of a bummer because if I choose to use a different program it will take me months to remember to unsubscribe.  This site does have one feature that I really like- to record or upload your pod cast all you have to do is click on the red circle in the top right hand corner of the home page. So searching needed.

Podomatic- This was far and away the most difficult program to sign up for.  I'm not sure why but for some reason it thought I was a robot the first three times I tried to register.  Once I was in I could not access the home page.  I kept getting the 404 code so I have little to add on this site.  I couldn't find a place to record my own podcast but I could upload one easily enough.

Over all creating a podcast is simple enough.  One tip- write your script out before hand or you will end up re-recording things over and over again!

I used Audio Boom to create a short book summary over Dorothy Must Die- a New York Times Best Seller for YA. My home room class has a read aloud every Friday and I like to introduce them to new literature. Unfortunately try as I might I cannot get it to embed into my blog.  And I tried.  Combined my husband tried for more than 3 hours to embed my podcast.  It was just not meant to be.  But you can hear my podcast by using the link below.

https://audioboom.com/boos/3300134-dorothy-must-die?utm_campaign=detailpage&utm_content=retweet&utm_medium=social&utm_source=googleplus