Idea for podcast...

Some ideas for podcasting...

1. The entire second semester of 9th grade English is a speech class. Students are required to do several small, medium, and large speeches throughout the semester. One of the major speeches is an oral interpretation of a children's story, tv show, movie scene, etc. The purpose of the speech is to help students develop their delivery skills: pace, pitch, volume, vocal variety, etc. The students are videotaped and are then required to watch themselves and complete a self-evaluation. I think that before I get to that point, I could use podcasting/audio recording to demonstrate what vocal variety looks and sounds like. I could record myself reading a children's story with very little variety and then with the right amount of variety. using the audacity or GarageBand software, I can actually show the studens to soundwaves and inflections and tec as they listen. They can then record themselves practicing and look at their own patterns in the soundwaves etc. I think that would be WAY more effective than me just telling them over and over. :)

2. This is very similar to #1, except I could do it with my theater kids. I could record them performing monologues in order to discuss their rate, inflection, diction, interpretation, etc.

3. One of the books we read is A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah. The story is about Beah's time as a child soldier in Sierra Leone during their civil war in the late 90's. Beah was eventually extricated from the war by Unicef and rehabilitated in camps set up specifically for child soldiers. It would be really cool to have the kids research the isue of child soldiers and the different groups and organizations that are working to help rehabilitate child soldiers and then put together a podcast to share that information. Sort of like a radio program. That would be an awesome project! :)