No need to get out of bed for those early morning lectures…just download the podcast!

Long gone are the days when a student’s sole research method was a trip to the library for hours of searching through dusty old bookshelves.

Education is changing at a tremendous rate. Technological advances mean that learning has evolved, and students in 2008 have a variety of learning resources available to them; email contact with lecturers, online articles, video conferencing and of course the odd dusty old book.

But it is podcasts that have most dramatically changed the way we learn, especially in the department of modern languages. Students of languages are being actively encouraged by their institutions to download and listen to podcasts in order to improve their pronunciation and listening comprehension. For example, the site ‘Deutsche Welle‘, Germany’s international news broadcaster, offers podcasts for students of German as a foreign language. The podcasts are free and are downloaded automatically onto your MP3 player. The topics covered are interesting and engaging for language learners of all ages.

The trend, which began in colleges in the United States, is becoming increasingly popular this side of the pond. The BBC has reported that ‘South Kent College in Dover has spent £25,000 on Nano iPods for 250 students’, so that the students can catch up on missed lectures. Some claim that initiatives such as these are a waste of tax payer’s money and a form of bribery, whilst others believe that it is important to find new and exciting ways of encouraging young people to learn.

Whatever your opinion, the fact is, learning has evolved due to our ever-increasing dependence on technology.