Beyond podcasting: creative approaches to designing educational audio

Abstract

This paper discusses a university-wide pilot designed to encourage academics to creatively explore learner-centred applications for digital audio. Participation in the pilot was diverse in terms of technical competence, confidence and contextual requirements and there was little prior experience of working with digital audio. Many innovative approaches were taken to using audio in a blended context including student-generated vox pops, audio feedback models, audio conversations and task-setting. A podcast was central to the pilot itself, providing a common space for the 25 participants, who were also supported by materials in several other formats. An analysis of podcast interviews involving pilot participants provided the data informing this case study. This paper concludes that audio has the potential to promote academic creativity in engaging students through media intervention. However, institutional scalability is dependent upon the availability of suitable timely support mechanisms that can address the lack of technical confidence evident in many staff. If that is in place, audio can be widely adopted by anyone seeking to add a new layer of presence and connectivity through the use of voice.

Toward personal and emotional connectivity in mobile higher education through asynchronous formative audio feedback

“…This Finnish inter-university online course suggests that novel formative audio feedback practice, which was inspired by and followed the peer-review practices employed by scientific journals, was promising in promoting the emotional engagement of students and personal connectivity between students and instructors in a mobile learning setting. The study confirms earlier knowledge in that audio feedback was perceived personal (Dixon, 2015;Middleton, 2009;Parkes & Fletcher, 2014) and adds that this was experienced whether or not the students met with their instructor face-toface (cf. Woodcock, 2016).…”

“…Studies indicate that asynchronous instructor audio feedback has been positively received by students and that they prefer audio feedback to written feedback (Parkes & Fletcher, 2014). Middleton (2009) presented results from a university-wide pilot designed to encourage academic staff to implement digital audio, including audio feedback, in their teaching practices. Based on the pilot, he concluded that if teachers are offered enough timely technical support, audio materials can help add a social presence and connectivity between students and teachers (see also Parkes & Fletcher, 2014).…”

Perceptions of International Female Students toward E-Learning in Resolving High Education and Family Role Strain

“…Jashapara and Tai (2011) argued that although people may have different levels of computer experience, innovativeness, and playfulness in e-learning settings, self-efficacy and anxiety play a crucial role in influencing their attitudes towards e-learning. Lack of technological expertise was revealed as the result to fear of working in e-learning environment (Middleton, 2009). Jashapara and Tai (2011) pointed on the critical role of training programs to alleviate computer anxiety.…”