Podcasting at the University of Connecticut: Enhancing the Educational Experience

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Podcasting at the University of Connecticut: Enhancing the Educational Experience

10/16/2006

By David B. Miller, Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut

At the beginning of my freshman year of college in 1966, I wanted to pursue a career in radio broadcasting. I even had a small amount of high school internship experience at local radio stations on which to build my dreams. However, by the second week of college I reexamined that decision because of doubts regarding future career options, especially for someone whose voice was far from the requisite baritone. So I switched to psychology for no better reason than I had done “OK” in a half-year of psychology in high school. Thus began my second career as an educator. Some forty years later, in September 2005, I purchased my first iPod (a first generation Nano) and realized that an opportunity existed to come full-circle. Combining what had become my career in psychology with my original passion for broadcasting, I discovered podcasting.

My first podcast was recorded using the built-in microphone of my Apple iBook G4. It was a recording of my midterm exam review session (attended by only a few students) and I made it available as a podcast for the entire 315 students enrolled in my class. Being among the more tech-savvy professors at the University of Connecticut, I quickly learned the basics of RSS feeds, XML files, uploading files to the Apple iTunes store, and publicizing podcasts on aggregator sites and blogs. With the help of some “how to” Web sites (e.g., http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/podcaststechspecs.html; http://www.podcastingnews.com/), I was up and running within a week.

As the first person to incorporate podcasting into courses at the University of Connecticut in fall 2005, I decided not to simply “coursecast” (i.e., record actual lectures). I felt that there was nothing particularly novel about recording lectures and questioned their educational value. I recall a memorable montage from the 1985 motion picture, Real Genius. The sequence depicts a class in a lecture hall at various points during the semester. In the beginning, the lecture hall is full of students. Tape recorders gradually appear at the students’ desks, and ultimately the students disappear, leaving only tape recorders. By the end of the film, the professor has been replaced by a tape recorder broadcasting the lecture to the students’ tape recorders. This recurring image makes me question the pedagogical value of routine coursecasting.

Portable access to recorded lectures is what’s new today, and this mobility underlies my use of podcasts to enhance and enrich my courses. This semester, I offer three podcast series – two for my General Psychology I course (which enrolls over 300 students), and one for my 85-student Animal Behavior course. My podcast series, called “iCube: Issues In Intro,” (