Podcasting in the Classroom

Podcasts can be a break from the norm for many students and teachers. Podcasts use technology, which most students find interesting. Podcasts also require students to create something using a 21st century skill, which all schools want from their teachers.

On the information side, students will obviously research, read, and analyze documents and information to create podcasts in a U.S. History class. I found a couple good links on the same website offering ideas and resources for students to create podcasts. See below:

http://fcit.usf.edu/podcasts/oral_histories.html
http://fcit.usf.edu/podcasts/historical_audio_diaries.html

These projects deal with students creating their own historical audio diaries and fictitious historical audio diaries on such topics as the Great Depression, the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and the Vietnam War. There are numerous things you could have students do with this including researching actual interviews and the recording mock interviews from that time period, have them record actual interviews with veterans from Vietnam or Desert Storm, and create mock live News Reports as if they were reporting live from the scene during a specific time period. This would all require research, creating, and editing which are skills all people use everyday.