I love podcasts. I love iTunes U. I love the potential of this technology for enhancing learning. But lord save me from the way most faculty use the technology. There is nothing more boring that listening to a 90 minute audio of a class session. It is even worse than sitting there listening to a faculty member talk to the white board as she/he writes on it. At least in person, you can be entertained by the non-verbals of others sitting through the same experience (torture?).

Podcasts offer exciting possibilities. At the least, they offer a different way for learners to access content. At the best, they offer a way for learners to access and interact with engaging learning experiences in a more mobile environment. I would hope we focus more of our develop efforts on the latter rather than the former. To restate an opinion from a previous post, we should design the learning first, and then utilize the technology to enhance the learning.

John Stinson