I found a great educational podcasting site at Education Podcasting Network. This site is a compilation of podcasts subscribed to and contributed to by educators dedicated to using technology. I listened to a podcast by James Basore, a Senior Instructional Designer at Golden Gate University in San Francisco, California. Mr. Basore has just recently begun podcasting. He is creating a podcast diary of setting up Moodle. He has found that the online discussion community has been a tremendous help with his Moodle self-education.
Mr. Basore goes on to describe his endeavors to setup a video lecture hall on a limited budget in which speakers can present and record their lectures both as podcasts and as videos as easily as if they were using PowerPoint, etc. He plans to broadcast further podcasts to the community at large and to call upon the online discussion community to help with the development of this new lab at Golden Gate. Mr. Basore’s podcast is a great example of how to use social network at all levels of education.
In researching this posting further, I found some other obvious uses for podcasting in education. ESL educators are embracing podcasting with open arms. They can use podcasts to prepare lessons for students in advance to address their individual needs. As most educators know, English as a Second Language classrooms often have students that speak a variety of languages. A teacher can create lessons in several languages or modify an English lesson for each student and podcast it for delivery at school or at home. An excellent site for reviewing podcasting in the ESL classroom is compiled at the ESL Podcasting Project Information.
