Review of Podcast

I have never listened to a podcast before so this is all new to me. Before I could begin this assignment I had to learn a few things first, like what was a podcast and how does it work? At first I found it to be confusing and very time consuming, but after listening to several podcast I was amazed at how much valuable information was available for educators. The first few podcast that I listened to came from Smartboard Lesson Podcasts. Most of these podcasts had similar characteristics.



The host of the Smartboard podcasts were all very enthusiastic, funny, and they loved to talk. I realized that podcast are very similar to radio talk shows. One of the podcast that I listened to was Teachers Connecting, A strong Foundation. This podcast was very informative. In this podcast a Kindergarten teacher discussed ways that she used webkinz, blogs, and smartboard in her classroom. She shared some great ideas on how to involve the children in the learning process. The podcast also gave some great information on links for teachers to incorporate in their classroom.



I also listened to several podcast from Kidcast and EDTechtalk. I found that the host in these podcast were also very enthusiastic and liked to talk a lot. I did not like these podcast as much as Smartboard. Kidcast had some neat ideas to get the students to be more creative, but it was too drawn out. The hosts talked more with each other then they did about the topic. The EdTechtalk podcast was confusing to me. I found it hard to follow and they also carried on with each other. They talked so much on their podcast that you got bored.



The Connect Learning podcast was great. The host was again very enthusiastic, but also down to earth. He went right to the heart of the subject and did not carry on. I listened to podcasting 96. It was a conversation about podcasting with media coordinating with Librarians about using podcast in libraries. The podcast was done live at a conference with 6,000 Librarians. I enjoyed listening to this podcast. The librarians could ask questions and get an immediate answer. Great ideas were shared on how to use podcast to connect with the classroom and then carry it into the home. The tone of this podcast was great!



I was not impressed with the podcast from Macbreak Weeekly. I found that it was confusing and hard to follow. They joked around to much and never got to the topic. I felt like I was wasting my time while they carried on a separate conversation ignoring the reason for the podcast. This Week in Photography was a great podcast. The hosts were friendly and they were quick to get to the point. The hosts shared some great information with the listeners. They discussed future podcast topics and how to get listeners involved. They also had news updates. The podcast I listened to also had information about different cameras and how they are used. I found Week in Photography podcast to be a valuable tool.



In doing this assignment I have found it very helpful. I think that podcast are a great tool to use as a resource. The majority of the podcast were very informative, but I did discover that it is very time consuming. As a busy mother of three I do not have the time to sit and listen to podcast that ramble on. Some of the podcast need to cut out some of the unnecessary talk and get straight to the point. I feel this would be more beneficial to the listeners.