Create and Engage with Podcasts that Matter

Building connections is at the heart of what we do as teachers: connecting students to ideas and course content, then helping them to connect those ideas to the world we inhabit.  We build connections with the students in the classroom along with one-on-one conversations during office hours, but how do we establish connection in the virtual environment? Listening to audio focuses one’s attention aurally and is an engaging and powerful way to connect with your audience. Like the stories – read aloud – that we loved to hear as children, podcasts can reach students in a more personal way. Podcasts offer compelling opportunities to create meaning, cultivate learning and encourage dialog remotely. While asynchronous and synchronous video capture excel at producing a flat screen visual surrogate to the classroom, it may also be distracting.