Duolingo Podcast

Learning Target OR Standards & Connections
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.8.6

Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and tasks, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate.

ACTFL WORLD-READINESS STANDARDS FOR LEARNING LANGUAGES

  • Interpersonal Communication: Learners interact and negotiate meaning in spoken, signed, or written conversations to share information, reactions, feelings, and opinions. 
  • Interpretive Communication: Learners understand, interpret, and analyze what is heard, read, or viewed on a variety of topics. 
  • Presentational Communication: Learners present information, concepts, and ideas to inform, explain, persuade, and narrate on a variety of topics using appropriate media and adapting to various audiences of listeners, readers, or viewers.
Essential Outcomes(s) Level(s)
Students will…

  • Enhance their listening comprehension in a language they are learning.
  • Create their own podcast using both their first language and another language they are learning. 
6-12
Activity/Project
Teacher will introduce the Duolingo podcast to students. 

  • Fascinating true stories to help you improve your French/Spanish/English listening and gain new perspectives on the world.
  • The storyteller shares in their language, and the host chimes in for context. 
  • If you miss something, you can always skip back and listen again. Duolingo also offers full transcripts at podcast.duolingo.com.

Students will listen to an episode of the Duolingo Podcast. They may choose between English to Spanish, English to French, Spanish to English, or Portuguese to English.

While students are listening, provide activities to enhance students’ listening comprehension skills. Here are some options:

After listening to the podcast, students will discuss in small groups or in a large group the following questions:

  • What was it like listening to the podcast AND seeing the text?
  • How did it feel to hear both languages in the same podcast?
  • What else did you hear?

Students will then create their own Duo languages podcast:

  1. Title project
  2. Create a track for each speaker
  3. Record the podcast using language-specific vocabulary
  4. Transcribe the voice tracks of language #1
  5. In Settings, change the language of the studio
  6. Transcribe the voice tracks of language #2
  7. Add sound effects to support the narration
  8. Add intro and outro music
  9. Share with the world 
  10. Show the studio for multimodal experience
Extended Learning
  1. Students can create their own website with transcript and description, like the Duolingo site. 
  2. Students can use Adobe Spark or Wevideo to create a video component to their podcast.
  3. Students can choose their own topic to podcast about in the language they are learning.

 

This lesson was co-authored by Soundtrap Education Specialist Serena Robinett, and former Soundtrap Education Specialist Audrey O’Clair during the 2021-2022 school year.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.


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