Turning Students' Phones Into Study Tools

​When I taught 5th grade, I borrowed an idea from U.S. History teacher Eric Langhorst and began recording audio review sessions for my students to help them review for Social Studies and Science tests. I called them StudyCasts. The goal was not to replace traditional studying but rather provide my students with another method of studying, a method that may be a little more agreeable to them when compared to solely poring over their notes. I figured, if students are always on their computers or iPods (yes, that says iPod -- this was 14 years ago), why not turn those devices into study tools? If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, right? Wondering what a broadcast sounded like? Here's the episode I recorded to help students prepare for their first geography quiz that year.

I've always believed that in addition to so many other benefits, technology has the "cool" factor, something that can't be underestimated with it comes to using tech with students. By taking the content I was teaching and putting it into a format that was easily accessible for students, my hope was they would be more likely to engage with the material outside of the classroom. If I made studying cool, maybe they'd be more likely to do it.

Did all of my students listen to StudyCasts? No, not all of them. But many did. And when I asked my class what they thought of StudyCasts, here's what one student said:

"I listened to the Puritan StudyCast five times and got a good grade on the test.”

Five times.

How often do students look over their traditional notes five times to study for a test? I don't have any official statistics, but I don't think the occurrence percentage is very high.

While recording StudyCasts is something I did nearly a decade and a half ago, I believe the concept is still relevant today (perhaps even more relevant, given the fact that so many students in the late elementary grades and above have their own phones). And with the advances in technology, the ability to create and share these audio recordings has become ridiculously simple.
 
If this sounds like something you'd like to try in your own classroom, check out my brand new ​4-part video series where I walk viewers through how to easily create their own StudyCasts. All four videos total just over 25 minutes, so in less than half an hour, you'll be ready to start recording and sharing broadcasts for your students! You can check out a short teaser below, and to access the FREE video series, click on the image below the teaser.

​Happy viewing and recording!

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