Task 4: My Very Own Podcast

I loved this assignment. It was great to be able to make my own podcast based on a topic I actually wanted to learn more about. I chose to interview my friend Danny about being a USA soccer superfan during the World Cup. I interviewed him over Skype (he lives in New Orleans) and used Garage Band for the entire recording and editing process. I’m a big fan of This American Life and Radiolab, so it felt like I was making a show like those, which was fun AND motivating. Those shows are serious journalism, and sound high-quality, so I was hoping to imitate that in some way. I didn’t feel impeded by the open interpretation-ness of the assignment, I found it rather freeing, actually. I hope I met the criteria for “[podcast has] something new and interesting to say”. While I’m certainly not the first person to be talking about the world cup, I hope I did bring a new perspective.

I discovered so many new things. Firstly, Danny gets frustrated easily by my complete lack of knowledge. But mostly I learned about soccer- important players, greatest games and goals, the US’ surprise skill during this years’ world cup. My favorite thing I learned was about the player Zinadine Zidane. He became famous as an excellent player for Real Madrid and the French national team. During the 2006 world cup, an Italian player allegedly insulted Zidane’s mother and sister. Zidane put this jerky Italian in his place by headbutting him in the chest (!). What a rebel. He was welcomed back to France as a hero.

I enjoyed the editing process. It put me in full control of the podcast, and ensured that I was fully responsible for what it turned out to be. When we first started the interview, I planned to do a story about Danny’s involvement in a local soccer club league. But he was so much more excited talking about the world cup, and it came through in his answers. I decided during the editing process to focus on that instead.

I decided to include clips of soccer commentary during the podcast to give the entire thing a more authentic feel, and to demonstrate to listeners the fervor of soccer commentators (They’re the ones who yell “Gooooooooal” for hours). This was surprisingly easy to do, and since the clips were all on youtube, I can be sure they’re available to the public. I added music at the beginning and end of the interview as well, to provide some bookends to the project.

When thinking about using this as a teacher, I am excited about the possibilities this project has. You could provide students with a simple prompt (like “Pride”, “Struggle”, “Secrets”), possibly in conjuncture with a class book, and leave the project open ended. The software I used (Garage Band) was surprisingly easy (and FREE!), so I think students could maser it without becoming frustrated. I can see a few limitations- if the school did not have access to laptops or computers that have Garage Band installed (or laptops at all) then the assignment would have to be done completely outside of class, which makes me nervous (you can’t assume students have access to computers at home). I’d have to ensure that students could use school laptops before I develop the assignment. But that is the only drawback I can imagine, otherwise the project has so many possibilities that I am positive I’ll use it as a teacher!