Benson students launch podcast | Local News | rutlandherald.com

BENSON — Students at Benson Village School are answering some big questions in a new podcast.

Beginning this month, the school’s sixth-grade class will launch “Ask the Benson Bears,” a podcast that will answer questions posed by fellow students and community members.

Students will work together in pairs to research answers and present them in a series of 10- to 15-minute episodes, which they will produce themselves.

School librarian Anne Marie Witt, who took a podcasting and education course at Castleton University last summer, thought the medium would be a good way to engage students and apply research, writing and communication skills.

“Podcasting includes technology skills as well as communication skills that students will find helpful in both their educational careers as well as their future employment careers,” she said. “As a school library media specialist, I look to help them develop lifelong learning skills that include reading, technology and communication.”

In addition to doing research, students will write outlines and scripts for the episodes, as well as learn how to use podcast production software and audio-recording equipment. Witt credited proficiency-based learning coach Abigail Wald and Principal Amy Roy, as well as other teachers and students with helping to pull the project together, calling it “a team effort.”

Sixth-grade teacher Elizabeth Schuyler said the project will help students learn transferable skills like collaboration. She noted it would build a foundation of skills students could take with them outside the classroom and into middle school and high school.

Student Madisyn Wilkinson, who recently listened to a podcast about what sound a giraffe makes, said she is looking forward to working on the project.

Student Ada Mueller, who is currently listening to a podcast about soccer, said she is excited to answer people’s questions. She said she is also eager to learn how to edit audio and use new technology she might encounter again in the future.

Witt said she hopes the project will inspire students to start podcasts of their own someday.

Principal Amy Roy said she likes how relevant the project is to the current types of media students encounter outside of school.

“I just think it’s imperative that we build these skills for kids to use in any way they want — to use it for entertainment, to use it for education,” she said.

She’s also excited to see what kind of questions students will be asked to answer.

“What we really want is to keep building that bridge with our local community and let them know the students are here, they’ve got valuable information, they’re eager to research what they don’t know and be able to bring it forward,” said Roy.

Questions submitted for the podcast, which so far have focused on science and nature, include: How does an octopus change colors and make their skin bumpy? How cold is Antarctica? What does whale blubber feel like? Where do insects go in the winter? Why is snow white? What causes sound? How does the meteorologist predict the weather? How is losing a tooth in Africa different from losing a tooth here in Benson? and how much colder is Pluto than Earth?

Roy added that the podcast is a way students can reconnect with the community after nearly two years of relative isolation due to the pandemic.

“Really, anything we can do to get community members to realize school is still happening, kids are still here. They’re learning, they’re growing,” she said.

Visit the Benson Village School Facebook page at www.facebook.com/BensonVillageSchool for links to new episodes of “Ask the Benson Bears.”

jim.sabataso

@rutlandherald.com

jim.sabataso@rutlandherald.com

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