WGBH Video Podcasting

'I listened to two videocasts, K-5: 'Solar Eclipses' and 6-8 'Homo Sapiens Versus Neanderthals.' In 'Solar Eclipses,' the videocast presented computer animated images of how a solar eclipse happened. There was an astronomer who spoke about how the sun is 400 times larger than the moon and the moon is 400 times closer to earth than the sun, so the sun and the moon appear (from earth) to be the same size, thus making a solar eclipse possible.

In 'Homo Sapiens Versus Neanderthals' (grades 6-8) there were several people who spoke on the subject, one of them being a professor from Harvard. They simply discussed the differences between Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals, such as bone structure, habitat, and the slight edge that Homo Sapiens probably had over Neanderthals.

Coming from a teacher's view point, I would use these videocasts occasionally to help reinforce a subject. For example, if my second graders were learning about the solar system, the 'Solar Eclipse' videocast would be very helpful because of the interesting computer graphics that helped better explain the process of a solar eclipse.

I would not, however, show the video cast for 'Homo Sapiens Versus Neanderthals' because it didn't seem to teach much you couldn't find in a text book. There were no demonstrations and the explanations were very broad and pointless. I like walking away from a learning experience with at least one 'fun fact,' and with this videocast, I didn't find anything interesting enough or useful enough to hold onto.