3 Easy Ways to Engage with Podcasts for Teaching and Learning

Podcasts are a great resource for teaching and learning. Now that they’ve been around for a while, there are a ton of easy ways to incorporate them into your classroom content, your assignments, and your own professional development. Here are three ways to engage with podcasts as an educational tool:

Incorporate podcasts into your course content.

There are so many wonderful podcasts that offer deep dives into content in a range of disciplines. Because podcasts are so easy to listen to on the go, they make a great addition to your course content since students can listen when they are commuting or while doing other tasks. Some great content-rich podcasts include You Must Remember This (about the history of Hollywood), Design Matters (about creative culture through interviews with artists and makers), and The Life Scientific (which profiles scientists and their lives and work).

Ask students to create a podcast episode for an assignment.

Choosing a unique medium for students to share evidence of their learning can foster creativity and independence. If you are interested in incorporating podcasting into your assignments, check out this guide from Princeton University, this resource from the New York Times, or this Lib Guide from the University of Delaware. Since podcasts can be developed using free and easy software, they can make a great creative assignment medium.

Listen to podcasts about pedagogy.

There are some really interesting podcasts about teaching and learning in higher education. A few favorites include Teaching in Higher Ed, which includes interviews with instructors from a range of disciplines; Lecture Breakers, which offers a bunch of different ideas for implementing active learning techniques into your classroom; and Tea for Teaching, which showcases innovative pedagogical ideas.

What are some of your favorite podcasts? What ways do you use podcasts to support teaching and learning?

Katie Linder, PhD, is the Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Innovation and Strategy at CU Denver. She first hosted a podcast for Oregon State University called Research in Action and has been podcasting ever since. You can contact the author at [email protected].