Literary Analysis Podcasts

TIPC Ratings

Approaching: Students construct a list of questions that will lead them to complete the task of sharing their podcast with their classmates via SchoolSpace and iTunes. Although Audacity is readily available on all student laptops, students seize the opportunity to research online sources for recording podcasts and then select the most appropriate digital tool to complete their podcast. Students research and prepare a step-by-step guide on how this first episode of their literacy analysis podcast can be uploaded to iTunes and shared via iTunes.

Target: After researching digital tools for creating podcasts, students select the best tool that will enable them to communicate their podcast to their classmates and any podcast listener beyond our school via the Internet. Students collaborate with each other regarding the content of their podcast, music selection and required elements (introduction, closing, etc.). The class listens to each podcast and makes recommendations for future growth in this area.

Target: Students use critical thinking to choose multiple resources from which to draw conclusions, based on clear patterns of evidence that produce new understandings. Students formulate purposeful questions that help them analyze and justify selected text from the novel in terms of the literary elements of diction, imagery, symbolism, and metaphors/similes. They use digital tools such as Audacity to organize, record, and edit their podcasts, as well as add special effects. As students playback their recorded podcast, they analyze their narration to determine the connection they make between the denotative and conative meanings of words from the selected text.

Approaching: This project is an opportunity for students to synthesize their research on the Secret Life of Bees, collaborate with classmates and communicate their literacy analysis to the class and beyond via a podcast, and apply critical thinking skills during the entire process of completing the podcast. As students prepare their list of steps to make their podcast available via iTunes, they are given the opportunity to examine trends in uploading podcasts to sources such as iTunes and make predictions regarding how this could be done 10 years from now. Students create original work within the parameters of the assignment.