Digital Voices

Podcasting is the newest form of personal expression in todays world. A voice recording, saved as an mp3 file, and posted on the internet for anyone to listen to and possibly download. This, to me, is simply amazing.What a wonderful way for people, who may have never been heard before this technology, to express themselves. When listening to “this i believe” essays, i was really amazed at how prfessional they sounded. You could tell that a lot of time and effort had been put into them. The authors of the speeches were able to further express themselves with the tone of their voice and the way in which they read their speech. This is a very effective way of speaking on their part.

When choosing which speeches to listen too i chose some at random and others i selected based on my personal interest to the essay. This ability to search and choose any speech one would like to listen to is also another great aspect to this type of internet technology. Podcasts and mp3’s are a much faster way of “getting the word out” in comparison to other types of technology, or perhaps lack their of, that we have experienced in the past. For example, the mail(once a day) or the news(once a day). The internet can be updated as many times a day as one would like, this can be much more effective.

To wrap things up, podcasting, the internet, and technology are all changing the way we, the population, express ourselves. Further more, it is dirastically changing our lives…

alex

Podcasting is a new and useful way, to get out information. I think that it really helps to be able to actually hear what is on the page, rather than just read it. Also, it is easier to see and understand when you can see what the person, looks, or acts like.

I listened to a lot of “This I Believe” essays, about life. I selected those pieces, because I like to see what views people have about life. These essays are things that people are really passionate about and things that they live their life by.

A lot of the speeches talked started with a story of why they believed this. Some also started with what they actually believed. The thing that was interesting about the beginnings was showing you how they came to these conclusions, rather than just saying I believe this just because.

In speech class, we’ve been reviewing informational speaking and speech in a technological world. In doing so, we’ve been listening to NPR’s “This I Believe” essays.

While listening to the essays, students considered the following questions. They’ll be sharing their responses on this blog and we’d like to extend this conversation beyond our classroom, so please comment on our blog to share your ideas with us.

After listening to the “This I Believe” essays, respond to the following:

What do you understand about podcasting now? What did you notice about the technology? The sounds?

Which “This I Believe” essays did you listen to? Why did you select those pieces? What stood out to you about the essay? What aspects were memorable? What was effective about the piece?

What did you notice about the introduction the speech? What was interesting about the introduction?

Podcasting is a growing trend.  But, what is it?  Visit the following url for a definition from NPR.

http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_directory.php?type=help

What interests you about podcasting?

In class, we’ve been discussing how speech will be influenced by advances in technology. We’ve read Time magazine’s “Person of the Year” for 2006 and discussed how speaking skills will need to adapt based on technology, as well as what jobs may require of employees. I invite my students and others to share your thoughts on this topic.

How does technology influence the manner in which presentations or speeches are given now or will be given in the future?