I suppose I should begin where I normally do on my quest to find information: Wikipedia. Even if I were not thinking about doing this, it was the first thing to come up when I googled "podcasting". Here's where I ended up:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcasting
Like usual, I found wikipedia a good place to start. From the entry, I got a general overview of the topic and activated some background knowledge. Now I am familiar with much of the vocabulary and have a general idea of what Rick is talking about (RSS aggregators?).
Once again, I found myself struggling a bit to comprehend RSS feeds and aggregators. Despite reading the wikipedia entry for RSS twice (once as part of the discussion of RSS aggregators and once during the reading of this article), I still am pretty confused about the mechanics, what actually is going on. Well, I guess I understand the important part: RSS feed is just like a television broadcast, only over the internet, that automatically downloads for the user.
Maybe I would better be able to understand all this if I downloaded an aggregator and subscribed to a few podcasts. Perhaps some hands-on learning would help me sort through the technical aspect of this technology. I'll need to try to set that up sometime this weekend.
All the jargon aside, I found out some really creative uses of podcasts. While I have heard about teachers podcasting their lectures, I hadn't heard or even thought about using podcasts as a publishing tool for students or to record classroom activites such as debates, performances, and book talks. My head is currently spinning with a variety of potential uses for podcasts in the classroom: fluency practice, modeled and guided reading, classroom "radio" shows, readers' "radio" theatre, and so on.
In addition to giving me some great background knowledge, Wikipedia has given me a variety of links to resources that might aid me on my quest to becoming a podcasting expert.
In regards to the name controversy, I would just like to say that I don't think the term "netcasting" or any other option is going to really catch on. It seems "podcasting" is here to stay. When my nose is runny, I am going to reach for a "Kleenex", not a tissue. When my ears are dirty, I am going to clean them out with a "Qtip", not a cotton swab. When I write in the blog, I am going to continue to discuss "podcasting", not "netcasting". Sorry Mr. Laporte. It stuck.
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1 comment:
Dear mary,
I like to consider myself and technologically savvy person but i don't really use wikipedia. I know about it and have heard about it but it is not an integral part of my information searching. I like mostly everyone else uses google. I think that rss is not as simple as the name states. I think of it as getting a newspaper every hour or watching headline news' 30 min updates all day. The difference is it is more geared to the info you want to learn about as opposed to the information they want you to learn about.
I enjoyed your blog.
Renaldo Slaughter
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