FINAL TRANSCRIPT: POETRY PODCASTING

01:00:04;06-01:00:11;04
[VAN OWEN I/V]
Hi my name is Gordon Van Owen. I teach 7th and 8th grade Literacy at IS528 in New York City and my lesson idea is Poetry Podcasting.

01:00:11;04-01:00:19;09
[1st Voiceover of student]
Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep and doesn't know where to find them. Leave them alone and they'll come home bringing their tails behind them.

01:00:19;10-01:00:30;00
[VAN OWEN I/V]
The podcast project allows the students to do a number of different things. They're improving their public speaking skills; they're enhancing their listening skills, but most importantly they're really enhancing their critical analyzation skills.

01:00:30;01-01:00:35;04
[1st Voiceover of student cont’d]
She found them indeed but it made her heart bleed, for they left their tails behind them.

01:00:35;15-01:00:35:10
[VAN OWEN I/V]
The Poetry Podcasting project is actually a mini poetry project. The students come meet with me after they've done a little bit of research on either a poem or a nursery rhyme. They type up a script that they're going to read and they pretty much sit with me for about 5-10 minutes after school and I record their voice.

01:00:51;11-01:00:55;27
[1st Voiceover of student cont'd]
And try what she could as the shepherdess just could, to tack again each to its lambkin

01:00:55;28-01:01:10;18
[VAN OWEN I/V]
I use free software that I download off of the Internet. I ask them to lay the script flat on the table so there's no ruffling of paper in the background and I hit the record button and the students do the work. The next day in class, I'm going to play it to the class and they're gonna get their critical feedback from their classmates.

01:01:10;20-01:01:14;24
[VAN OWEN addressing the class]
On the tables in front of you, I put the rubrics for the day so everyone needs to have one of these in front of them.

01:01:14;29-01:01:32;18
[VAN OWEN I/V]
I have rubrics strips ready on the tables for the students. On the rubrics there's different levels for the presentation, 1, 2 3, & 4, 4 being the highest score; meaning that the person's presentation is very clear, it was easy to understand and they're reading with emotion, because really the purpose of the project is for students to practice their speaking abilities.

01:01:32;26-01:01:40;10
[Angelina’s recording]
Hi this is Angelina and I am going to talk about Jack Sprat. In 1189, John, a.k.a. Jack Sprat married Joann...

01:01:40;15-01:01:49;23
[VAN OWEN I/V]
Each podcast is played twice. During the first playing, I ask the students just to actively listen to what is being said in the podcast and how the student is saying it in the recording.

01:01:49;28-01:01:56;18
[Angelina’s recording cont’d]
Jack Sprat could eat no fat; his wife could eat no lean. And so betwixt the two of them, they licked the platter clean.

01:01:56;22-01:02:13;09
[VAN OWEN I/V]
This time around I really want them to focus on what grade they are going to give the student and then if they have some extra time, they can start filling in some of the anecdotal comments. Before I play it the second time, I always remind them, “listen carefully, think about what you heard the first time because you never know, you might hear something different the second time around.”

01:02:13;13-01:02:19;18
[Angelina’s recording cont’d]
Jack ate all the lean, Joann ate all the fat. The bone they picked it clean, then gave it to the cat

01:02:19;23-01:02:29;02
[VAN OWEN I/V]
The great thing about using nursery rhymes is that first of all they're short, so they're not very intimidating. The podcasts are generally 30 seconds to 90 seconds at most and that includes the history.

01:02:29;06-01:02:35;22
[Angelina’s recording cont’d]
When King Richard went on crusade from 1190-1194, John attempted to take the crown of England.

01:02:35;28-01:02:53;14
[VAN OWEN I/V]
There's a couple different goals that I came up with when I created this project. First of all, I was that bashful student that didn't like to get up and speak and I wanted to give my quieter students the opportunity to still present in front of the class without the intimidation factor of standing up in front of 29 or 30 of their peers. And as they're listening to each other's podcast, they're also practicing their critical listening skills.

01:02:53;20-01:02:58;15
[VAN OWEN addressing the class]
Alright, so we have any volunteers who'd like to give Angelina some constructive feedback, Imani?

01:02:58;18-01:03:03;20
[Imani: 1st student response]
She was good and I liked how she was loud, but her voice did not match what she was talking about at parts.

01:03:03;22-01:03:19;20
[VAN OWEN I/V]
I really hoping for accountable talk where they're using phrases like, “oh I agree with so and so, but I disagree in this regard,” and with their constructive feedback, I always ask the students to start with something positive because I'm a strong believer that everybody has done something that we can learn from and then to give them something that can improve on.

01:03:19;23-01:03:27;10
[2nd student response]
It was a little hard to understand because you were kind of quick and maybe you should give a little bit more emotion next time. Overall, it was a good reciting.

01:03:27;11-01:03:32;03
[VAN OWEN I/V]
Then, the student who we just listened to gets to share their reflection on how they felt they sounded.

01:03:32;05-01:03:34;27
[VAN OWEN addressing Angelina]
Angelina, what's some of your feedback based on listening to yourself?

01:03:34;28-01:03:47;01
[Angelina: Student response]
I think I could have done it more clearly when I was rehearsing the nursery rhyme, um, ...um...I, I think I was loud, but I was hard to understand.

01:03:47;03-01:03:59;00
[VAN OWEN I/V]
It gives the students a sense of confidence when they can hear themselves speak without actually having to stand up and speak in front of a class. And in my eyes it gives them a chance to critique themselves and in a middle school level, that self reflection is very important.

01:03:59;03-01:04:13;25
[Angelina addressing the camera]
Hearing your podcast in the class helps you because you get to hear how you sound, see if you talk clear, so when ....you're doing something like a presentation in front of somebody, you can annunciate and maybe project your voice more.

01:04:14;00-01:04:33;12
[VAN OWEN I/V]
The Poetry Podcast project does a lot for my students. They work on their public speaking skills, they're enhance their critical listening skills, but most importantly they're practicing their accountable talk and their constructive criticism while analyzing a peer's work. So while every English teacher wants them to be able to analyze a book or a novel, this allows us to start that process on a very local level.