Our podcast group from Lincoln Elementary “What’s Up Lincoln?” has officially posted its first podcast on Trojan radio at Lincoln Elementary School’s website under the student tab. If you would like to hear the podcast please follow this link. This podcast is about tongue twisters. The children had a lot of fun trying to say the phrases without getting their tongues tied up!

It is very rewarding working on the podcast with a group of 14 high ability students! The students have a lot of great ideas, and we are all learning together.  Here are a few things that have worked for us so far:

1.  We use audacity software – which is free software – to record our podcasts.
2. I use a blue snowball microphone. It does a good job of picking up the children’s voices and is easy to work with. It plugs directly into my computer and works well with the audacity software.
3. I let all the children have a speaking part in the podcast. They enjoy being included and have learned a lot about using their voice while being recorded. They all laugh when they hear their voice since it always sounds different in your head than it does out loud. One student covers his ears when he hears his voice!
4. I divided the children into small groups to work on different topics. Our next podcast will include local school news and March Madness!
5. We are using music that I have written so we don’t have copyright issues. Later I would love to let the children help me write some songs, but at this point there isn’t time for that.

Our group only meets once a week for thirty minutes. It is the only time available for both me and my students. Since our time is so limited, I have to have everything prepared ahead of time and ready so we can accomplish a lot in a short time. We spend a week on writing, a week on editing the writing, practicing lines, and recording. At this point, I’m doing all the editing on audacity. Fortunately, there are a lot of tutorials on YouTube to help me when I get stuck!

I hope to get five or six podcasts done before the end of school this year. Next year, getting the podcast group organized should be a lot easier since we will  have learned a lot this year. It is a labor of love!

“Unity is strength… when there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved.”
-Mattie Stepanek