Podcast tools???

I teach English/Language Arts and Computer Skills to middle school students, and also computer skills to teachers in a 6-12 private school. I've been asked for an easy way to create podcasts. I've played around with Audacity but it's way more complicated than we need. Teachers just want to record and then post to their class website. It's easy finding somebody else's content, but we want our own. Ideas and suggestions are extremely welcome.

Thanks, Fran

Tags: podcast, tool

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Permalink Reply by Sally Rafson on November 17, 2008 at 7:11pm

Hello,
I have been experimenting with different scenarios for podcasting for the last several months. I tried using Audacity when I only had a PC. I used Gcast to host the podcast. Then, I went to a free weekend seminar on podcasting and blogging. It was incredible the diversity of people that I met who are using or are trying to use this technology. While there I was introduced to a host that provides several services for podcasting and makes it very easy to place on the web. It is libsyn.com. I have been using my MAC which makes podcasting incredibly simple. Now, as a language arts teacher my class is in full swing using the podcast to record papers that the students write and putting them on the internet for others it hear. The students love it, the parents love it and I love the pedagogical benefits that it has given to my students. My answer for the easy to use podcast technology has been recording in Garage Band on the Mac, then loading it onto the host at Libsyn.com and Itunes.

Permalink Reply by meL on December 17, 2008 at 1:25pm

My colleagues and I are baffled by Audacity being complicated! I taught a class online this summer and teachers had to create their own podcasts using only a video from TeacherTube on Audacity (http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=cb3860f2a6d4b38c6490). Most of the teachers who took the course were "low tech" and they did wonderfully. Granted, many of them just read a story or talked about a historical figure. Aside from pointing Audacity to the LAME mp3 encoder the first time you export as an mp3, it is simply press the record button, talk/sing/whatever and then press the stop button. Even the instructions in the Podcating Booklet make it far more complicated than it needs to be. Suggest to the beginners to begin with the basics: just talk/read/sing in their first few recordings, then begin to learn to add the extras. And as someone already said, if that doesn't work, let the students handle the recording.

Permalink Reply by Sally Rafson on December 17, 2008 at 6:42pm

I first tried using a PC and Audacity to produce my podcast and it was a hassle. I now use a MAC with garageband and the host is Libsyn.com. Podcasting has become easy and fun! Libsyn charges $5.00 a month to host and distribute the podcast. This is much cheaper than other hosts out there. They provide the RSS feed and send it to Itunes where listeners can have it automatically downloaded as new episodes are added. Or, they can go directly to Libsyn to get episodes. Libsyn also provides reports as to when people are getting the podcast and how.

The MAC and Garageband are very podcast friendly. My parents, students and colleagues really enjoy hearing the students read their papers. The kids communication skills are enhanced. They need to read with expression, become aware of the shortcomings in their writing and now write for a purpose other than sticking their paper in a portfolio.

I highly recommend this combination of a MAC computer, GarageBand and Libsyn.com.
You can hear my podcast on Itunes at msrafson's podcast.
Thanks,
Sally

Permalink Reply by Mark Cruthers on December 29, 2008 at 8:20pm

I recommend you take a look at authorstream's power point presentation platform as a podcaster for ppts.

Share your PowerPoint presentations on iPods, iPhones and YouTube or download them as video! authorSTREAM lets you embed presentations in your blog or website, or you can share them on iPods and even on Youtube. You can also download them in the industry standard MP4 format. The presentations remain the way you created them, with animation, slide timings and even audio narration.

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by Niki55

Uploaded on authorSTREAM by aSGuest8177

Permalink Reply by Eve Heaton on February 4, 2009 at 8:18pm

Thank you so much for this post. I have been killing myself looking for a way to share my students powerpoints that also maintains their slide transitions and audio. I will definitely be looking into this.