Podcasting on the Fly with Soundcloud

Whether you’re teaching online, hybrid or traditional face to face, there is always a need to communicate with your students. That communication doesn’t have to be difficult or complicated. “What kind of mic do I need? What editing program do you recommend? How do I compress the files? Can I upload media to my LMS?” These are all good questions, but it’s really not necessary to worry about these things. If you have a smart phone and a Soundcloud account, you’re ready to go. Below I walk you through the process of recording a podcast on your mobile device, where you can do a minimal amount of editing, and then embed the podcast right into a Canvas announcement.

So many of you might ask, why wouldn’t you just record audio using the built in tools in Canvas? That’s a good question. Sometimes I do, but those files are not high quality and I don’t have control over them. They’re posted where ever I create them in Canvas, but it’s either not possible or difficult to reuse those files. I have control over my Soundcloud files and they are higher quality. Also, there is one step I neglected to share with you – the ability to Add External Feed in Canvas. You can then add your SoundCloud feed directly to your Announcements in Canvas and skip the embed step. That means you can post a podcast using only your mobile phone. I haven’t tested this step yet, but when I do, I’ll let you know how it works.

Creating the Video

What I used to create the video: I used my Samsung Galaxy SIII mounted in the Case Star Octopus Tripod Stand, the Soundcloud app, the iPevo Point to View USB Camera to record the video of my phone, and Jing to record the computer screen.

iPevo Point 2 View USB Camera

Case Star Octopus Tripod Stand