Thing 19

Here are the podcasts I listened to including my likes/ dislikes /classroom usage.

1. Warner Archive Collection - Abe Lincoln in Illinois- This was a play about Abe Lincoln it was rather an old play and the audio was not to clear. You really had to focus to understand it. I would not share this with my students. If anything I would listen to it myself on a lazy Sunday night when I had nothing better to do.

2. Mandarin Chinese Lessons with Serge Melnyk- I found this pretty interesting. In fact we were discussing the possibility of offering students Mandarin Chinese through a grant from the ISD at our last staff meeting. I am thinking what is it? This podcast broke it down into simple instruction that a kid could follow. I learned that "Ne How "spelling is off, means hello. I think even my first grade students could learn some simple words / greetings in chinese with this podcast. I would probably download it to an mp3 player and have students learn a few words a week. I would have the mp3 players at a station and students would rotate to it during reading rotations.

3. Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing - I would use this podcast if I was teaching high school. It had a nice jingle to it and added life to grammar which is usually pretty blah for students.

4. Manic Mommies - The daily life of 2 moms who work full time and have kids. I thought this was a bit comical to listen to. I would not use this in the classroom. My wife might be intersted in listening to it.

5. Poetry Everywhere - I liked this podcast. It read a poem with video to it. This was above and beyond elemetary age kids comprehension. I would use maybe at HS/College level.

6. PBS podcast - American Experience - If were teaching middle/high school social studies I would integrate some of the podcasts they offer into my lesson plans. Not long ones though - students would do better with the video. They had many topics to choose from which could easily be integrated into a lesson.

7. Audiblekids - I registerd for an account and found that they had a lot of great books to listen to especially for my first graders. The bad part is that there was a fee for each book and it could get quite expensive. They had a few free ones and samples. If I had the extra cash I would purchase a few because they had tons of books in the 5-7 year old range. I would have this at one of my centers during center time.

8. Storynory - same reasonings as number 7 above but most of it is free although most of the stories are made up by others including students. I would use this in my classroom as one of my centers during reading rotation.