About Podcasting

Summary

Podcasting is an online place where people can upload their audio files to share with related group and they can also download those files in mp3 format and store it in any kind of player so that people can listen it anytime and anywhere when they find time. So it is very comfortable to all. Podcasting can also be used to develop Radio type content so that it can be helpful to use it as an educational purpose. Now there are four kinds of ELT podcasting and they all are different from each other according to their aims.

They all are

1.     Authentic Podcasts deal with higher level students and it provides rich         source of listening.

2.     Teacher podcasts aim to produce listening files for their students to provide listening content which are not available elsewhere.

3.     Student Podcasts are produced for students with the help of teachers and it helps students to know about all over the world and also they can create their community.

4.     Educator Podcasts deal with the ELT teachers and methodological matters.

Podcasting can also be used in the classroom and teachers can also upload homework tasks and students can follow downloading the audio files. In this way we can create podcast and to do that we need to have means of recording, audio editing software, weblog, RSS Feed and space online to store the audio files.

In this way Podcasting is enormous web tool that can help teachers to solve various problems with physical large classrooms. Here students can visit at any time whenever and whatever place they are free. This is really revolutionary tool in online education. Thus, I kindly recommend using this tool those who really interested to teach speaking in interesting way. Other tasks can also be taught in effective way but it very suitable and comfort to teach speaking skills.

Thus I would like to conclude this here saying that this tool is very useful to teachers and students as well.

In the end of all these discussion I would like to share my way of using this tool in the language classroom. If I get chance to use this tool, I will assign various tasks based on various language topics and also I will be able to teach poetry in interesting way. I will upload various audio files based on literary texts and students will learn listening skills and they will also be familiar with various literary texts. In this I will teach language and literature simultaneously. So this is the vary vary useful tool in the hands of language and literature teachers and it will also be helpful to wind up classroom walls.

About Nicenet

Introduction

Nicene is conferencing software and it easily available on net. Users do not need to download because it works only online so Nicenet is nice online software where teachers can create a virtual classroom and can share information with the members of group. Nicenet has all facilities to share information with the members of group e.g. teacher can send message to his students and can also get reply. This is freeware so anybody can get service from this software. In this way Nicenet is very useful to create an interactive classroom and it has conferencing system so teacher can manage his class easily.

How Nicenet Works

Nicenet can also be transformed in to virtual school because here same students can attend various online classes. A class is composed of sections or topics and within each topic messages can be stored and can be arranged according to date and also can be personalised. It is possible to have written conversations with the members of the virtual class and the teachers. Most important thing is that all members of the same group will have a mailbox for private messages that no one else will be able to access. There is also some drawbacks that teachers cannot upload files if they are not available on internet so only online files can be uploaded.

How to Start

First of all one has to access site called www.nicenet.org where teachers need to log in clicking on “create class” and students need to “join the class”. In this way teachers will get the class key which they can share with their students and without it students will not be able to approach the class again and teachers need to remember their username and password to log into class again. Teachers can send class key to various students in all over the world. In this way distance learning and teaching can be possible.

My Experience

I have created online classroom with the help of Nicenet software and it aims to teach certain ELT topics like Cohesion and Coherence in Writing. I have got students from ELT classroom and they are instructed to read various stories written by well known writer like R K Narayan uploaded on Nicenet and asked to observe very carefully all the linking patterns in the entire story. Then I have asked them to reform particular story in their own words so that I can check cohesion and coherence into their stories. In this way this kind of learning and teaching is really fun. Students can learn without any kind of threat and can express themselves completely.

Conclusion

In this way Nicenet software is very useful to both teachers and students and it also very interactive because students and teachers can deal with any subject through messages. But the important thing is that both students and teachers should have internet connection otherwise they cannot get help from this software.