Since my first blog post on educational podcasting almost 8 years ago, podcasting and more specifically educational podcasting has become mainstream. At the core of the podcasting experience is the idea of creating a series of audio episodes with the intent of educating, entertaining, starting a discussion around a particular topic, raising awareness, or simply for establishing a communicative channel with a target audience which could be your students, fellow teachers and colleagues or the general Internet audience.
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| Image credit: Unsplash provided through Piktochart |
As Kathleen Morris stated, there are two ways teachers and students can tap into the educational potential of podcasts: you can either use podcasts created by others in which case you have a multitude of options to choose from or you can create your own podcasts. In this post I am sharing with you some of the tools you can use to create your own podcasts. I will share a list of the best educational podcasts to listen to next week, stay tuned.
To create a podcast you need a microphone preferably an external professional microphone for a better voice quality but you can always use your device’ built-in microphone. You will also need an audio recording tool to record your podcast (see below). Once your podcast is ready you can upload it to your classroom blog, share it as an audio file with your colleagues and students; or if you want to go a step further you can even host it on a one of those podcast hosting platforms out there. Some of the tools listed below such as Podomatic and Anchor offers the possibility to both create and host your podcasts on their platform.
Here are some of the tools to help you create your podcasts:
1- Anchor
This is a platform that allows you to record and share your podcasts. You can also upload audio episodes you recorded and edited elsewhere to your Anchor account and share them as podcasts. One particular useful feature in Anchor is the ability to “add any track from Spotify to your episodes. Combine songs and your own talk segments to create with the total freedom of audio”. Another good feature from Anchor is that you can have it automatically share your podcasts to major listening platforms such as Google Pdocasts, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify. Using the Analytics dashboard you will be able to better understand how your podcasts are performing and get an idea about who is listening to them and where.
2- Podomatic
Like Anchor, Podomatic enables you to record, upload and publish your podcasts. It also lets you store up to 6 hours of recording for free. Its analytics tool provides you with stats about your podcasts including “Geographical data for plays, downloads, embeds, likes, comments, follows and visits”.Podomatic offers you various sharing options including direct play from Facebook and Twitter feeds and embed codes to share your podcasts on your blog or website. Besides creating your own podcasts, you can also use Podomatic Podcast Player to “tap into the best in Music and Talk shows, and puts your favourite content at your fingertips, wherever you are. From House Music to Comedy to Politics to Technology, there is something for everyone.”
This list contains what we believe are some of the best audio recording tools for teachers and students. You can use them to record audio episodes to host on Anchor or Podcast or any other podcast hosting site.
