Podcasts

I found Rozema's  article to be interesting.  I for one love listening to podcasts and will listen to at least one before I go to bed.  I think it's great that Rozema has her students create book reports through a podcast and allow them to be seen by outsiders.  I also found it interesting that she set limits; that they couldn't summarise but could only promote and provide hints to encourage viewers to read the book for themselves. Rozema states, "I play podcasts to entice students into reading superb YA novels such as Feed, Monster, The Chocolate War, and others and to give them a sense of the podcast requirement, which in turn shapes the way they read the novel" (34).  I feel that a simple podcast can shape the way a student reads novels.  It allows them to look for underlying theories and various topics to discuss, while reading a novel, for their podcasts.  It unintentionally forces a student to focus in on a book instead of quickly skimming through a reading.  Not only this but Rozema compares a blog to a podcast and points out the similarities.  In class we discussed how  blogs give students the chance to find their voice in their writing.  Podcasts can do the same.  They allow students to find their voice in how they view a reading.  Or how they interpreted a particular passage.
 I find podcasts to be an amazing project to assign students and will definitely be utilising podcasts in my future classrooms.