Podcasting in Education

            Since a podcast is audio or visual content that is automatically delivered over a network through free subscription, it is an incredibly useful tool for both educators and students.  Podcasts can be either audio or visual so students can not only listen to recordings, but also watch presentations, demonstrations, and video references on their iPods quickly and easily.  Teachers are able to send their students lectures via podcasting, and students have access to immediate updates from teachers concerning class lectures, student presentations, test reviews, basically anything that is available to them in class.  This can open up a whole new world for students, allowing them to have the internet and all of its resources at their fingertips in and out of class.  It will make it easier for teachers to send information and knowledge to their students, without having to sit at a computer.  Students will have free, easy access to a dual platform manager (Windows and Mac) that will provide them with more information than they could acquire in class alone.  Students and teachers will have access to things going on around the world, and information can be sent quickly and effortlessly.  It can be an incredible teaching tool allowing students to explore and research topics, news, and world happenings more in depth and to a higher degree.  Podcasts in audio are also favored because students can listen to an animated, “explaining” voice that will help them understand the material better as opposed to that of a professor.   Those iPods that are enhanced also have a chapter function, which allows students to skip to a specific section of the chapter that is on the iPod, without having to go through the entire chapter.  Podcasting is thought to be so effective by some, that Duke University gave all of it’s students an iPod in the fall semester of 2004 because it was starting to include podcasting in it’s curriculum (Barnett).  The objective of podcasting is not to give away intellectual property, but to enhance the teaching and learning capabilities of teachers and students and allow for more information to be sent and received faster and more efficiently.  This raises the issue of intellectual property.  The main problem with podcasting and intellectual property is the ability to download music for free.  Record labels are fearful that podcasts will lessen their intellectual property and revenues from music that would normally sell in stores.  Although listening to songs through iPods are temporary, with technology advancing, the opportunity for freely saving songs in the same form as iTunes is gaining.  Unfortunately for record labels, there are copyright laws for streaming music online, but these laws have not yet caught up to the radio-like programming available to download on iPods.  There are also other problems that arise from having iPods in an educational setting.  Unless there is a way to completely regulate what students are allowed to download and view on their iPods, it can also be a great distraction.  Students would have access to sites and information other than that of an educational nature, taking their attention away from the classroom and the teacher. Podcasting also allows for less face to face communication between teachers and students, therefore making the value of the teacher lessen.  No matter the implications, podcasting is on the rise and it is viewed as a incredibly useful tool for education, not something that will hinder it.  “Done well, podcasting can reveal to students, faculty, staff, communities-even the world- the essential humanity at the heart of higher education”(Campbell).