iPods Enhance Traditional Learning Experience Outside the Classroom
By Lauren Vespoli ’09
News Associate Editor
Little white headphones peek out of a classmate’s ears as they walk from class to class. The mini-music players are dug out of bags on midbus rides to away games. iPods seem ubiquitous on this campus—and many others. According to an MSNBC.com article, Apple had sold more than 100 million iPods worldwide as of this past April. Educators have picked up on the trend, and in recent years more and more high schools, colleges, and even middle schools are using iPods as learning tools in and out of the classroom.
In 2004, Duke gave 1,600 iPods to incoming freshman as part of a study of the effects of iPods on academics, according to a 2006 USA Today article. The iPods came preloaded with school-related information such as freshman orientation schedules, the school song, and the academic calendar. In addition, the university created a website modeled after the Apple iTunes site where students can download music and course content such as lectures and other study materials. The article also reported that Duke students found the iPods helpful, as they could fast-forward to a part of a lecture they didn’t understand. Since lectures were available for download online, many teachers and students expected more students to cut class. Many students, however, felt that there was a lot done during class that still made it important to go. According to an October 9 New York Times article, 93 of the 2,000 courses offered at Duke now require iPods.
Widespread Use
Duke is not the only university that has adapted the iPod for use in the classroom. Brown, Stanford, University of Michigan, University of Wisconsin at Madison, and the University of Missouri School of Journalism joined Duke in piloting “iTunes U,” a program created by Apple specifically for college students. The program uses the same technology as the iTunes Music Store to enable students to download lectures as they would any song on iTunes and load it onto their iPod. The Apple company website advertises workshops for educators interested in incorporating iPods and podcasting into their curriculum. According to the Harvard Medical School’s Web site, all lectures there are available in podcast form, and students only need to subscribe to their classes’ podcast feed to get access.
The Brearley School, a private school for girls on the Upper East Side of New York City, requires students in grades 7-9 to buy or rent iPods, which are required in foreign language, music, drama, and English courses, according to the New York Times article. The personal listening devices are also being used in the classrooms of less affluent communities, such as in the New Jersey Union City District, which is giving out 300 of them for an experiment similar to Duke’s. At Jose Marti Middle School, bilingual students use iPods to learn English. Students sing along to English music, listen to audio books in English, and use recording devices that can be attached to the iPod to listen to their pronunciation, the article reported. The district is planning to extend the iPod program to kids with disabilities and behavioral problems in the near future.
Potential at Choate
Although the lecture courses common at many colleges and universities aren’t offered at Choate, iPods could still be useful tools, especially in music and foreign language courses. Students in the chorus, for example, are required to do quartet tests, and “a lot of students like to have some sort of recording they can listen to help them,” said Ralph Valentine, Choate’s choral director. Mr. Valentine said he is unsure, however, whether iPods themselves are necessary when students can just get music clips off of their computer. He added, “The response I get from a lot of the kids when I try to share stuff on computers is that it doesn’t work for some reason. The technology isn’t always reliable.”
Scott Mattoon, head of the Foreign Language Department, brought up the benefit of the iPod’s size. Even though “iPods manage digital recordings in much the same way that desktop and laptop computers can,” he said, their individual portability “offers students more opportunities to listen to content, both in terms of time and geography...consider, for example, the student who travels abroad and can bring along language-related recordings of all kinds on an iPod.” French teacher Anne Armour also sees the advantage in the portability of the iPod. “Tracks could be put in a playlist for a student’s class, and they could listen to them on the way to an athletic contest.”
But has the department ever considered incorporating iPods into the curriculum? Mr. Mattoon said that Choate’s language lab director, Charles Long, “has promoted the use of iTunes as a way to collect and manage recordings made in our language laboratory and to encourage students who already have iPods to synch their corrected work with a technology they already use frequently.” The advantage in this system is that “students can listen to the latest hits while reinforcing their language pronunciation,” he explained. Mr. Mattoon doesn’t advocate bringing the devices into the classroom, however. “I don't see how integrating iPods, which are by nature an individual experience, into classroom experience, which is by nature a group experience, can enhance language learning in a collective, interactive setting,” he said.
Supplement to Class Work
Mr. Mattoon said, however, “if they can enhance our work outside of the classroom—via relevant podcasts or collected personal recordings in the language lab, for example—then this popular technology has a potentially constructive academic use.”
Mrs. Armour agreed that iPods could be especially helpful in reinforcement “outside of the classroom,” especially for homework. Her French 550 course listens to an audio book in the fall on CDs, and if they “had permission from the publisher, we could give them tracks to listen to while they’re doing their reading, which helps reinforce spelling and pronunciation.”
Despite their academic potential, if iPods were integrated as course supplements, would Choate students use them? “If they’re giving me a free iPod, then yes, I’d definitely use it,” said Noel Titus ’09. But Kelly Greenwood ’09 explained, “For language classes now they give us CDs and clips to listen to online, so I don’t think an iPod program would even be necessary.” Elli Foster ’08 added that having “An iPod program would be a good idea, and definitely make use of the technology most students have. The only downside is that it could easily alienate students who don’t already have this technology.”
So could iPods be useful learning tools at a school like Choate? “Maybe, but I don’t know for sure,” said Dean of Academic Affairs Kathleen Wallace. “If we were ever convinced iPods were an invaluable learning tool then I suppose we might consider providing them for students, but I can think of a lot of other things I’d rather provide for our teachers and students to enhance teaching and learning than iPods.”
Sang Won Koo ’09 uses his iPod to study. iPods have been integrated into curricula at some schools. PHOTO/Andrew Dominguez '08
