Week 10 Reflection: The Pros and Cons of Podcasts for Me

Much of the discussion this week has focused on the pros and cons of podcasts, something which has come up and quite a fitting time. Just this week, I met a mother whose son's special need hinders his writing output. When tested orally, he is gifted, but when the test is based on his ability to write, he scores far below the average. She raised the question of how students are assessed in English at our school, which is, to be frank, only on their writing. Every single assignment is a writing assignment (we had some oral presentations but only in summer school, and it was just a bonus assignment).

I have been thinking a lot lately about how I assess students, partially because I am part of an inquiry team, investigating assessment for learning (AFL) at my school. At the moment, my entire course is based on reading and writing (even new ideas since taking this course, such as a collaborative wiki project, is based on writing). Can they read and understand the excerpt provided? Can they then write about it effectively? Those two questions summarize many of the assignments in my course.

So, the pros of podcasting for me:

1. It can assess students in an alternate way of learning. Indeed, one of the biggest criticisms about our online English course is that ESL students like to take it so that they can avoid doing oral presentations/group work, something that shy ESL students would prefer to avoid. If students have to make podcasts for the class to listen to, this would fulfil the speaking component of the oral language prescribed learning outcome (PLO) of English 12. Listening to podcasts made by other students would fulfil the listening component of the PLO (they could prove that they have listened by responding).

2. It is new! We are always trying to do something new with the curriculum. This is partially to avoid the huge problem of plagiarism that occurs in online education, but also to ensure that the course is fresh and creative. Doing something completely new like this would be incredibly positive.

3. It is engaging. A big part of the AFL inquiry team that I am on, which I mentioned earlier, is about examining how assessment can be engaging for the student, thus making the student become responsible for his/her own learning. This new idea of the podcast truly engages students; in fact, Anita's recent post on the discussion board talks about how a colleague found podcasts to be extremely popular with his ESL students.

Then there is the con:

1. Students do not always have access to the necessary software. Some students last year did not even have Microsoft Word, instead submitting assignment on AbiWord or Open Office. To expect students to have a computer good enough to download Audacity and Lame, and to have headphones/speakers and a microphone, might be a bit much. This was part of the reason that last year we made video presentations a bonus assignment: just in case students did not have webcams. We could still make it an assignment, but to address the issue of equipment, it may have to be a bonus assignment.

With all these pros and cons in mind, I am still excited to be able to fulfil the oral language PLO. As I mentioned in previous posts, I am in charge of English 12 summer school this year, and can probably pilot the idea then. The first step, of course, is to learn how to do it myself. Stay tuned for my next post . . .in podcast!