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I love learning.
And September always brings about feelings of new daily routines, fresh slates, and regimented breakdowns of what you’ll learn in the coming months. God, I love curriculums and syllabi.
Anywho, it likely has to do with the fact that I’m the most Virgo person you’ll ever meet, and the majority of my extended family are teachers; seriously, I counted upwards of 15 teachers among my immediate family, plus cousins, aunts and uncles.
But what does this have to do with podcasts, Emily?
Thank you for asking, let me school you. Podcasts are succinct, jam-packed with knowledge, and absolutely perfect for classroom use. This summer, I chatted with some relatives about their plans for the school year, and many were looking to add podcasts to their teacher toolkits. So let’s see what’s out there in the world of classroom podcasts.
I first learned about podcasts being used in the classroom when I was writing a feature about the ethics of true crime podcasts for the Review of Journalism. For that story, I spoke to Maureen Carolan, consultant of experiential programs at the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board, who used CBC’s Finding Cleo to teach students in her high school Indigenous Studies class. Students told her that “every student in Canada should listen to this podcast.” So she went to work making that happen.
In summer 2018, she developed a free teaching guide with her colleague Paula Nevins, a literary consultant at DPCDSB. Host Connie Walker worked with them on the curriculum, and Dufferin-Peel’s Indigenous Education Advisory Council provided consultation.
Educators can use the guide to examine topics brought up in the podcast, like the Sixties Scoop, the history of genocide and colonization, the horrific legacy of the residential “school” system, and the Adopt Indian and Métis Program.
Emotional resonance drew the students into Cleo’s story; they could actually hear the voices of those impacted by the tragedies. “[Students] were quite shocked and dismayed by what they learned about the country we call Canada,” Nevins told me. Their teaching guide has been downloaded thousands of times across North America, throughout Europe, and even in Australia and New Zealand.
Our Canadian broadcaster has been leading the way in the education space. CBC’s Podcasts in Class program, launched in 2019, helps teachers bring podcasts into their classrooms by providing lesson plans, slides, handouts, homework, and even videos for two of their shows, Tai Asks Why and The Secret Life of Canada. NPR has a guide for how to actually make podcasts with students, but that’s a topic for another day.
Podcasts are great for the classroom for a bunch of reasons: they’re accessible, they jumpstart conversations, they’re easy to use, and they can be replayed. We fully expect to see more classroom podcasts being made in the coming years. Podcasts and classrooms are basically a match made in heaven. What’s not to love?
P.S. We just made a show that'll be used as a learning tool for nursing students! It’s called Stories from the Field, and it was created in collaboration with the University of Toronto's Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing. How cool is that?
The Globe and Mail is hiring an assigning editor. You’d steer the coverage of the tech sector, and other business verticals.
CBC is hiring a provincial affairs reporter in Victoria, BC. It’s a temp role that goes until March 2022.
TVO is hiring a producer/journalist for The Agenda. It’s a 12-month contract. Salary range: $57k to $70k.
AllNewBrunswick.com is hiring a full-time reporter for their Moncton, NB office.
Early birds! CBC Nova Scotia is hiring a reporter/editor assigned to Information Morning on the mainland (in the Halifax office.) I listen to Info AM all the time. If any of our newsletter readers get this job, I’d be so jazzed.
Chatelaine is looking for new lifestyle, style, home & food writers—especially those with fun, service-y pitches that work for their audience of Canadian women in their 30s-50s. They pay roughly $0.50/word for online pieces. More info here.
Freelance handling editors, here’s something. St. Joseph Communications is looking for an editor to work 3 to 4 days a week for the rest of the year, mostly at Maclean’s and Canadian Business. You’d be pitching, assigning, editing, writing, and deck packaging. Sounds fun!
If you haven’t listened to Connie Walker’s Finding Cleo yet, you really should. Yes, it’s three years old, but it was extremely popular for good reason.
It’s intriguing radio, expertly reported, beautifully told, and there’s an honest to God decades-old mystery that gets solved at the heart of it.
Now that’s compelling storytelling.
Need tips on how to be a more natural-sounding podcast host?
I wrote a blog post about that very topic, adapted from a guide that senior producer Jay Cockburn made for one of our clients.
Share it with a host in need!
Jaimie Johnston was on Building Good. He works at Bryden Wood, an international company shaping the future of construction and creating sustainable design solutions. Listen to hear about how their approach to building could reduce costs and make for safer workplaces.
We want to hear from you! What are you looking for in your podcast news?
Let us know on Twitter, Instagram, or by email at info@vocalfrystudios.com.
Thanks to Katie Jensen for designing this newsletter.
We’ll see you again on September 17. Until then, here’s an update from my kitties Luna and Buffy, who were recently fixed and had to wear T-shirts of shame. What a sin.
Yours in friends and fries,
Emily
