EDF3514: History of Education in the U.S.

Podcast Project: Turning to the Past to Understand Our Educational “Now”

For this assignment, you will select a topic presented in one of our assigned readings (your “anchor reading”) that you wish to explore more. Your topic should align with one of the following themes. You will research that topic and develop a podcast episode designed to: (1) convey your learning to a broader audience in an accessible format, and (2) highlight the relevance of the topic to a contemporary educational problem, question, or happening. Our course LibGuide will be a resource to guide you in your inquiry, and you will be expected to use it to craft your Show Notes (the research) for this project. You may select a topic aligned with one of the following themes:

1. Educational Movements: For this theme, you will focus on a movement or advocacy effort to shape educational change. This theme invites you to explore the relationships, networks, and social change strategies in community-based efforts to impact education.

2. Educational Sites or Characters: For this theme, you will analyze a specific traditional educational site (i.e., school, college), non-traditional educational site, or an educational character. Some examples of non-traditional educational sites are study groups, student organizations, parents’ organizations, places of worship, adult education spaces, and other organizations outside of schools that provide(d), influence(d), or practice(d) education. An educational character is a historical actor that was or is involved in an educational movement, event, phenomenon, or advocacy effort of interest to you.

3. Educational Philosophies: For this theme, you will select a particular    educational philosophy, pedagogy, or approach encountered in this course to guide your inquiry.

There are four parts to this assignment:

Part 1: Podcast Proposal and Outline: Your 2-page proposal should outline your focus topic; which course material (“anchor reading”) it relates to; what contemporary educational policy, problem, or practice the topic elucidates; and how you’ll structure your episode. Specifically, your proposal should address the following prompts:

1. What is your topic, and with which of the provided “themes” does it align?

2. What question(s) is/are animating your inquiry?

3. What is the "anchor reading" (assigned course material) on which your topic is based? How did the anchor reading inspire your topic? 

4. What contemporary educational problem, policy, or practice does your historical topic help us think more deeply about?

5. How will you organize your episode? Include a timestamped topical outline of what you will cover.

Part 2: Show Notes: Using our course LibGuide as a starting place, you will first conduct research and compose “Show Notes,” an annotated bibliography of at least 6 sources that you draw on in your podcast episode. Your first source should be a course reading that is anchoring your topic; which course material engaged with your topic and inspired the questions you're asking about it? In addition to 1 anchor source from our class, you should identify 4 secondary sources and 1 primary source that we did not read in class. For each source, you should include the full APA citation; a description of how the course LibGuide led you to the source; and 5-6 sentences summarizing the source's key point(s) and elaborating how you’ll use this evidence in your episode. You should identify sources that help you understand the historical movement, character, or site you selected AND its relevance to a contemporary educational problem, policy, or practice.

Part 3: Podcast Episode: Then, using your “Show Notes” as your research basis, record a 10-minute podcast episode on your topic. Your episode should do the following: (1) Introduce the topic to a broad audience, (2) Explain how your topic deepens our understanding of, challenges, invites new possibilities for, or complexifies a specific educational problem, policy, or practice today, and (3) Conclude with a “call to action” for listeners that emphasizes the “so what?” of the topic and outlines possible action steps listeners can take to impact the educational problem/policy/practice at hand. Please clearly reference the research outlined in your Show Notes to substantiate your claims. Please upload your Podcast Episode and Show Notes to the Canvas Discussion page (in addition to the appropriate assignment pages) by 4/20 so your peers can engage with your work in the Listening Room stage.

Part 4: Listening Room: In the Podcast Project Discussion board in Canvas, you will review and provide feedback on two peers’ Podcast Episodes and Show Notes.