Web II and Ped II February 26, 2007

Again, I have been thinking a lot about the use of audio files. It took me forever to figure out how to make one , and edit it. (I haven't yet posted it anywhere, but that's the subject of another entry!) All the while, I could not for the life of me resist asking myself, "how or why would I every use this information?". Again, like my musings about wikis and blogs, I want to know that this is a pedagogically sound thing to introduce into my own teaching and to suggest that others use as well. Why would I, as an educational administrator, require my faculty to go through the pains of learning this technology if it had no real practical application? The answer is that I wouldn't.

I also asked my students if audio files would be helpful to them. Many said that it would be different and therefore engaging, but only a few said it would be helpful. Then I asked them if it would be helpful if I put a transcript up along with the audio file. That got a resounding yes from the assembled crowd (okay, just a class of 12 students, but they seem like a crowd sometimes).

It occurred to me that this also goes along with what we have read about how students learn. Using one form of input for information is never as good as two or three or more. This is evidenced by the fact that many of the students with learning differences use books on tape to help them compensate for for their differences.