Podcasting in the History Classroom

Introduction

The University of North Carolina’s School of Education defines higher order thinking as: “Complex thinking that goes beyond basic recall of facts, such as evaluation and invention, enabling students to retain information and to apply problem-solving solutions to real-world problems.” I’ve always believed that the greatest gift or talent of humanity is our aptitude for creation. Our ability to create and our propensity for artistic expression overshadows man’s many shortcomings. And so from a teacher’s perspective, I’ve always thought synthesis, the prime rib of high order thinking, to be the ultimate goal for our students.

For history teachers especially, but really for all teachers, podcasting is a simple and easy way to enable content relevant student synthesis. And what better way to encourage creative expression and the internalization of critical historical facts and thinking processes than with a tool that helps the students participate in the cutting edge technology of the adult world. Unfortunately podcasting has not been fully integrated into today’s high school history classroom. Yes, regrettably, podcasting remains mostly relegated to higher education, and even there, its kept mostly in the hands of teachers and out of the hands of students.

Indeed, the iTune’s podcast store is littered with podcast recordings of lofty professorial lectures from the star teachers of the elite collegiate academic staffs. Slowly but surely, however, podcasting is following the lead of the blogging phenomenon, and democratizing the airwaves of the internet. If teachers can manage to put this tool in the hands of their students in a relevant, meaningful, well-thought out, responsible, and structured way, then our children and the state of education will be better for it.

The Abridged Idiot’s Guide to Podcasting

If you’re trying to help your grandmother understand what a podcast is, you might liken it to a magazine or periodical that is delivered over the internet as an audio or visual file. She still may be lost, but chances are your students are going to be at least moderately familiar with podcasts, and will certainly understand talk of mp3’s and other related terms. What your students might be surprised by, is the idea that they can create and publish podcasts of their own. Podcasting is a great way to excite students about content knowledge (historical facts and historical thinking processes), help them internalize this knowledge, and give them confidence in the glory of their own creative expression and their mastery of an important and universally-recognized technological tool.

Podcasting is rather simple. The necessary equipment (computer, headset with microphone, basic editing software, and internet access) are things that almost any high school technology department and/or library has in its possession. The following are several links that can help students and teachers better understand the very simple process of creating and publishing a podcast of your own.

This About.com guide is made by an expert on radio and audio media: http://radio.about.com/od/podcastin1/a/aa030805a.htm.

An excellent how-to website is Howcast.com. It is here that you can find an amusing but clear video on just about anything. He is one on how to create your own podcast: http://radio.about.com/od/podcastin1/a/aa030805a.htm.

At http://thwt.org/historypodcasts.html, a page on podcasting by the folks at The Center for Teaching History With Technology, you can find bulleted steps on using Garage Band to record and edit your own podcast.

Last, but not least, this website offers links to a number of various guides on podcasting in the classroom. It is the most extensive of all the websites listed, and also the most organized. It provides a number of how-to guides, links to specific lesson ideas, and much more. Check it all out at: http://teachdigital.pbworks.com/podcasting.

Classroom Examples

The Center for Teaching History With Technology (mentioned above) provides a number of resources for teaching with podcasts. The website and pages on podcasting include a lengthy list of podcasting lesson plan ideas. One idea calls for “Students to write a radio drama based on a historical event and record their show (complete with commercials) using an iPod and a voice recorder.”

http://thwt.org/historypodcasts.html#education

The following website offers an inexhaustible amount of links to podcasting classroom examples from both the Elementary and Secondary Education levels. Some are produced by teachers, but the majority of the classroom examples are podcasts created by students.

http://teachdigital.pbworks.com/podcasting

This website is created by a teacher, and it focuses solely on her use of podcasting and other technology use in her history classrooms. She includes many published podcasts, some of them simply her lectures, but many of them are recordings of class discussions.

http://masterymaze.com/masterycast-list

My Ideas for Classroom Use

Pro’s

Con’s

Like any lesson involving the internet and technology, podcasting in the classroom has the possibility to leave students lost and stumbling around, accomplishing very little. They may be very excited, and having fun, but if the lesson is not focused, the results could be disastrous. Being very conscious and detailed in your lesson planning and execution is essential to keeping the students on task. As well, opening the students up to the internet is always a dangerous proposition. But proper navigation of the internet and effective incorporation of technology into the classroom is essential. Teachers must just be deliberate and diligent in there preparation and performance. Children are capable of some wonderful things, when they inspired, and armed with the right tools. Teachers who can keep their children focused, on-task, and producing efficiently will realize the pro’s of podcasting in the history classroom will almost always outweigh the negative side effects.

Consideration for Teachers

Before you bring podcasting to your students, I would recommend for teachers to experience podcasting first hand. First, if a teacher is completely oblivious the vast library of academic podcasting in existence, go to the internet and the iTunes store and explore. Listen to some of the podcast lectures by famous professors. Check out some of podcasts produced by elementary, middle, and high school classrooms. Then, I recommend teachers try producing a podcast on their own. Record a mini-lecture to introduce a new topic to your students. This will help familiarize the teacher for future instruction, as well as show students the power of the podcast and the ease of its production.

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This work is licensed by Brooks Hays under a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 3.0), and is an Open Educational Resource.

Last edited by Brooks Hays on Oct 5, 2009 8:03 am GMT-5.