Tuesday, November 14, 2017

Yes to Podcasts!!

Going into reading the article on podcasts vs. textbooks I was biased and I have to say I still am considering they came to the conclusion that neither textbooks nor podcasts had significantly better results. I personally love the idea of having a unit on podcasts in a classroom. In almost every class, there are some types of reading assignments and for new English Language Learners (ELL) this can seem so daunting. I love the idea of getting to pull a podcast into the mix for students because it switches things up for them but keeps the root of the lesson on literacy, just in a new way.
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What’s cool about podcasts is that students can still follow along as they listen but for student’s that are not strong readers, I think this would help them a lot because they would be able to keep up with the rest of the class and words/phrases that they typically would struggle with, they would get to hear read out loud correctly. I also think for students in general, whether they struggle with reading or not, being read to is one of the best experiences. I realized when we were talking in class last week that that is something that I didn’t appreciate as much as I should have! So many students are not read to as a child so I think giving them that experience, even in a classroom, is worth it even if there is no huge statistical difference in results.

1 comment:

  1. I am with you about bringing podcasts into the mix for my students because it is something different. I also agree that having the transcript so the students can follow along will help ELLs and struggling readers. I worked in a prekindergarten class at a daycare all throughout high school and realized that they were not the only students who liked to be read to. The afterschool kids also loved for me to read to them. I would read them a chapter everyday and they really enjoyed it. Even the students who were fantastic readers. I thought that once kids were in middle school they would not like their teachers to read to them, but now I am leaning toward maybe reading to my students would be fun. WC:128

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Farewell!

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