I had my first taste of working with pupils podcasting this week at Adelaide Primary School and what a splendid experience it was too. The pupils were very enthusiastic and after a brief introduction to the Podium software, the pupils were given 30 minutes to have a play with the software to try out its features.
The software, for me, strikes a wonderful balance of being simple enough to use, yet be sufficiently powerful to do the job. The pupils enjoyed using it too and withing 45 minutes, most had produced and saved their first efforts.
After break, we sat them down and discussed the trickier task ahead: deciding on the theme of their podcasts. Ideas that were given included: School news, Sports Updates, Soap Updates and a Pop roundup, but perhaps the most impressive were 3 girls who are writing a comedy show to broadcast.
We have to get the hosting of the podcasts sorted, but this is in hand.
I’ll be returning to the school soon to show them how to get their podcasts onto the web and how to download them, and more importantly, how others can listen. The school has chosen to purchase the hosting from Podium at about £150 per year,but there is a free hosting option avaialbale at YHGfL. It’s just that the Podium site offers more functionality and a rather pretty podcast player.
I’ll report back once the podcasts have gone live.
Very soon, schools subscribing via the LA Internet SLA will be receiving a copy of Podium and school site license via the internal mail.
Update 19th July
Well, the technician did a splendid job getting the settings into the PCs so the podcasts could be sent so I popped back for an hour to show the pupils how to send their podcasts to the web and how to listen to them once they were online.
They had worked on them in the meantime, so they all had something to publish. Once demonstrated, the pupils uploaded their effots and there they were, online and available for instant playback.
We used Internet Explorer as time was short, but there are other methods. One of the features available from hosting at the Podium site is a player you can embed and pop into your Learning Platform or school website.
This session was a tad rushed as the end of term and the transition week was fast approaching, but having used Podium, I think I’ve found a piece of software that is simple enought to use, yet sufficiently open ended and powerful to provide interest and challenge to pupils of all ages. Well done the publishers on this one.
