Anchor
This podcasting platform is owned by Spotify and is 100% free. Well, nothing is 100% free. Ads are placed throughout your podcast but it’s a small price to pay (or not) for a free podcast. This site is so user friendly that I can see 4th and 5th graders using it with little instruction. A user board is placed on the lefthand side, and you follow them to create your show. The microphone with the application works very well. Each segment can be recorded separately, and music can be added to each segment if you wish. The transitional piece list is quite extensive with many moods available.
Once the segments are recorded and your transitional pieces are chosen you drag them over to the right-hand side in the order that you want. You can preview the episode before you save it. Once you have it the way you want, it’s time to save the episode.
Podbean
Podbean is free for the first 5 hours of podcasting and has three different paid levels depending upon what you need. While Podbean is not as beginner friendly as Anchor, it is still quite simple to get a podcast started. Podbean has a “How to start a podcast” page with embedded videos to guide you through the process. They make it easy to have cohosts which is the way that most podcasts are done today. If not a cohost, then each one has at least one guest. Podbean has lots of sound effects and music to add.
The “how to” guide starts with having a vision for your podcast. Before you even start with any of the digital stuff you must answer of few of their conceptual questions to get an idea of who, what, and why of your podcast. Then they guide you through planning your episode before recording it which is a particularly crucial step. This is where students would be doing their research and communicating with one another to develop a plan for their podcast. Once the podcast is done it is published and shared.
My partner for an assignment and I spent a crazy amount of time trying to figure out how to use Podbean. I had used Podbean before to record a podcast, but I had never had a cohost before. This was throwing a wrench in the works. After a brief consultation with the resident IT man, we found the problem and we were on our way to recording our first podcast. This really was so much fun to do and I can see how children would really get excited about using this kind of technology for learning. Here is our first attempt at podcasting.
https://www.podbean.com/ew/pb-tucp9-1307415
Buzzsprout
Buzzsprout lets you try it out for free with no credit card. There are three distinct levels of paid subscription, but I tried the free one. I will have up to two hours of content per month. I really liked one of the first screens of Buzzsprout which asked about your podcast experience. I chose “I’m new to podcasting” and got to a screen with several options. I finally figured out that you record your podcast somewhere else (I just used my phone’s recorder) and upload it to Buzzsprout. Once it is uploaded you give it a name and description. Then it’s time to publish it. This literally took me about 2 minutes once I figured out you had to record elsewhere and upload it. I’m going to put this 25 second podcast here, but it’s literally me talking about what I’m doing and the cat fight outside.
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2078896/11637777
I Kid a Pod
A podcast by kids was started by Mrs. Treptow who used ELA time for kids to research, write their script, work on summarizing and main idea skills, and then report on the status of the Iditarod. Asking her kids to create a podcast, she said in season 7 episode 1, they made progress in reading, speaking, and listening skills. They were engrossed in their studies and came to school early to finish the project.
What an amazing podcast and it’s all children doing this. They are motivated and dedicated to their work.
Yakubovsky, Mike. “Handing Students the MIC: Podcasting to Increase Engagement.” ASCD, 11 June 2020, https://www.ascd.org/el/articles/handing-students-the-mic-podcasting-to-increase-engagement?utm_campaign=1519-hs&utm_medium=email&utm_source=ascdexpress.
Great explanation of the different podcasting platforms. My partner and I also used Podbean. We didn’t have as much trouble with it and felt it was fairly easy to use. The only hiccup I encountered was that once it was recorded, my recording didn’t include her voice, but I quickly found that I simply had to merge both recordings to complete the task.
Allyson,
My partner and I also used Podbean. We did not seem to have as difficult a time with it. I was nervous at first because it seems hard to create one podcast from two different places. Once we found out how to do it, it was much easier. Then, I just had to figure out how to merge both to one. I really enjoyed using Podbean.
I am fairly new to podcasting but I have heard of many of the platforms you mentions. I really enjoyed doing the podcast with you but yes it did take us a while to figure it out. Despite that podbean was one of the easier free platforms that I found. I think podcast in general will be the future of learning in our classrooms.