PODCASTING

A Podcasting is the latest in internet technology. It is a series of audio or video digital-mediaportable media players files which is distributed over the Internet by syndicated download, through Web feeds, to and personal computers. Though the same content may also be made available by direct download or streaming, a podcast is distinguished from other digital-media formats by its ability to be syndicated, subscribed to, and downloaded automatically when new content is added.

Podcasting is a method of publishing audio files (usually MP3s) to the Web, which are then made available through subscription and automatically downloaded to a personal computer or portable MP3 player. It is similar to a radio broadcast but the files are available for downloading from a website and you can have them delivered to your computer via an RSS feed.

Education is made portable through podcasting and there is great potential for the use of podcasting within education.

They are useful for useful for

• recording short explanations

• clarification of a concept

• suggestions / tips about the course and content

• instructor experiences / reflections about the content

• interviewing an expert

• student presentations / reflections / record of events

• improving students' communication skills (vocabulary, writing, speaking, presentation)

• peer review for students

• oral histories

• oral guides for museums, art galleries, historical tou

Some advantages are:

• Users have full control over what they listen to and where and when they listen.

• Audio files can be downloaded onto an MP3 player which students can take away and listen to in their own time.

• Podcasting provides the educator with another way of meeting students' needs.

• Family members can access podcasts at home and keep up to date with what is going on the classroom.

• Available anytime/anywhere for students

Disadvantages:

• Computers need sufficient bandwidth for downloading the MP3 audio files.

• Podcasting is not designed for two-way interaction or audience participation.

• Amateur podcasts do not have the same quality as professional broadcasts.

• Some initial training is needed.

• Entire file is downloaded to students' computer/device

Some educators are integrating podcasting successfully into their classes. Podcasting enables educators to use music and recorded audio to enhance learning. The addition of photos and video to podcasting allows educators to add a wide range of visual content to their teaching and address even more learning styles. Educators across the nation are using podcasting in their classrooms for language arts, language acquisition, and social studies. Some school administrators are looking at podcasting as a great way to communicate with students, teachers, parents and their community.

Task

A task is a group of several activities that allows students to learn while using the target language in a communicative way. These are some key features of the task that the teacher should take into account: input, roles, settings actions, monitoring, outcomes and feedback.

AN EXAMPLE OF A TASK-BASED LESSON

Since it is quite important to include culture while teaching a foreign language, the following task will present an example about how teachers can add this component to their classes.

Language and culture are linked. Language is a part of the culture and the culture can be exposed through the language. In this way, if the learners have cultural knowledge about the target language, they could use expressions--for instance--bearing in mind the context, the receptor, the semantic and pragmatic meaning and so on.

There are a lot of topics used in teaching culture, some examples are:

-Festivities

-Food

-Clothing

-Traffic

-Religion

-Music

-Education

-Idioms and proverbs

-Customs

-Dancing

Books, Web sites, films, videos, songs, newspapers, magazines and pictures are some resources where the teachers can find information about culture topics.

Task title: Music around the world

Grade: 8th

Level: Pre intermediate I

Subject area: English

Context: Private bilingual school in Cali. A group of twenty five students

Time: 6 hours and 35 minutes (hour=45 minutes)

Topics: Music Genders

Objectives:

"Demuestro que reconozco elementos de la cultura extranjera y los relaciono con mi cultura" (MEN document on Standards, p.25.)

"Hago presentaciones cortas y ensayadas sobre temas cotidianos y personales" (MEN document on Standards, p.25,)

Pre-task

The group will be divided in 5 teams who are going to listen different kinds of music (Reggae, Tango, Samba, Country, Polka, Arab, Andina, Africana, Ranchera and Cumbia) played in CD player. Each team should identify where these pieces are from. The names of the countries and the nationalities will be pasted on the classroom's board for the matching exercice. (20-25 minutes)

Task-cycle

Stage 1

The teacher will give a piece of paper to each group with the following questions for discussion:

-From the music you've just listened to, Which one do you like the most? Why?

-Why can of music do you usually listen to? What do you know about it?

-Is it possible to find a relationship between your favorite music and one of the samples?

(10 minutes)

Stage 2

They share the information (10 minutes)

Stage 3

Students will listen to an interview about the music around the world. And then, they will answer to who, when, where and what is the interview about.

After that, the students will be given a worksheet to fill in the blanks with the information of the previous interview. (10 minutes)

Stage 4

The teacher explains to the students that they (in the same 5 groups) have to make a poster of a music gender. The names of the music genders (Reggaeton, Electronic, Bachata, Pop and Salsa) will be writen in pieces of paper (inside of a bag.) One student of each group will have to take one up.

Students will be taken to the resources center (Library or Computer's room) to find information about the following topics of their specific music gender:

-Origins

-Famous singers or groups

-Musical instruments

-The most popular songs

(1 hour)

Stage 5

In the classroom, the students will make a plan about how they are going to make the poster and how they are going to present it--with the information they have found. In that way, the teacher could give them support (materials or technological equipments)

The teachers will guide them in this process making suggestions and giving advices in order to keep the purpose of the activity. The students will have to give this plan to the teacher at the end of the class (one per a group.) (1 hour)

Stage 6

Two hours will be given to the students to make the poster and prepare the presentation. The teacher will continue guide the students making corrections in grammar and in pronunciation.

Stage 7

The students will present their posters and the information they have found about their music gender. (This presentation will be evaluated taking into account: Fluency, pronunciation, sintax and vocabulary) (1 hour)

Feedback

After the activities, the students and the teacher will make a conclusion about the subject (its importance and what they learnt about it); the activities (cooperative work, searching of the information and the poster); participation ( motivation, interest.) (30 minutes)

The posters will be pasted in the school's bulletin board in order to motivate the students.

By Ayda lucy Zambrano, Javier Hernández y Viviana González

Students of Foreign Languages

No one has a better learning style than anyone else and everyone has a mix of them. By understanding the personal learning styles of our students, we can help them to prevent frustrations, to have more tools to learn, to to face situations that are not oriented towards their learning style and to improve their quality of learning.
Using multiple learning styles and multiple intelligences for learning is a relatively new approach that educators have started to recognize. By applying these two aspects in the classroom you will provide opportunities for authentic learning based on your students' needs, interests and talents and they will be able to demonstrate and share their strengths.
It is true that take into account the learning styles and the multiple intelligences can improve our work and the students' work, but it is also true that in the real world, and real time, these theories are not applicable in the classroom with more than 20 students. Is it possible to adapt your teaching to suit each learning style of such a group? I don't think so. If you have a small group of students, ok, implement these theories and improve your teaching. But if that is not your case, your misson is to help students to be aware of their own learning styles, their strengths and their weaknesses; and also to make them understand that they should open their minds to different learning styles instead of only one.

SO WHAT?

WHAT?

Each person learns and processes information in a different way, that's why we can find a lot of learning styles. These are the particular or individual methods or techniques that help us to learn easily. It would be appropriate for us, as teachers and students, to be aware of our own learning styles and take into account the learning styles of our students to improve our work in the classroom.
There are also the well known Multiple Intelligences, a theory developed by Howard Gardner in 1983. This theory proposes eight different intelligences in the human beings: linguistic, logical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal and naturalist. These intelligences serve to have a broader vision of education and methodologies in the classroom and they are directly related to the learning styles.