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Course content on iTunes?

Monday, February 27, 2006


Now appearing on your students’ iPods — Mary J. Blige, Black Eyed Peas, Weezer . . . and UW course content.

It’s already happening here, as part of a UW-Madison study of the feasibility of using podcast technologies in instruction. In a one-year pilot test, DoIT is providing startup funding and consultation services to the 80 faculty who received Adaptation Awards for 2006 from DoIT’s Engage program. The award recipients all teach Timetable courses, and their goal for the pilot is to determine the effectiveness of instructional podcasting.

The pilot is using Apple Computer’s iTunes U, a new service that enables colleges to use part of the iTunes Music Store to distribute course content and other audiovisual materials. The collaboration with Apple enabled UW and the Engage program to experiment with podcasting for instruction without having to build a separate podcasting capability for the campus.

“The pilot will run through 2006,” says Dirk Herr-Hoyman, a member of the project team at DoIT. “It’s not a formal trial, but we’ll get an idea if podcasting is useful in this context and if we should pursue iTunes U as a solution or go in another direction.”

Apple initially tested iTunes U at UW-Madison, Brown, Duke, Stanford, University of Michigan School of Dentistry, and University of Missouri School of Journalism.

Faculty participating in the pilot prepare audio tracks that students can obtain from a noncommercial area of Apple’s online music store. The course content ranges from interviews to music samples to foreign language passages.

“We’re impressed by the creative approaches faculty have been taking as they harness podcasting technology to reach students in new ways,” says Jan Cheetham, another member of the DoIT podcasting team.

Examples include:


  • As part of his 500-level class in Field Ornithology, for example, Zoology Professor Mark Berres is providing iTunes U versions of recorded bird sounds that his students can use for field identification.

  • Professor Tim Osswald of Engineering records a three-to-five-minute podcast episode that highlights the social relevance of each class of polymer he presents in his Manufacturing Processes lecture.

  • Two instructors in the German Department, in collaboration with L&S Learning Support Services staff, produce a radio style podcast, “Das treffende Wort,” that reinforces grammar.


For more information on the Engage 2006 Adaptation Awards for podcasting, see engage.doit.wisc.edu/podcasting