Individual Research- Jess Kelsey

Pass it on Podcast Research. Before we started our project, we needed to research how an informative but enjoyable podcast should sound. As we wanted to get a good balance between both we listened to a lot of podcasts and read a lot of articles on practical skills and how people learned these and if they have passed these skills on. This would help us with content for the show and see if there was a lot of people out there who had passed on skills. First I found article about learning a practical skill.

Learning Practical Skills

This article is from the Belfast Telegraph named “From darning socks to making chutney, how traditional skills are dying out in family home”. Although our podcast will be about passing on skills, this article talks about the lack of skills being passed down from mothers to children now. As you can google everything to find out how to do it there is less and less skills being passed down from parent to child, “it seems that wealth of everyday know-how is either being lost because it’s not relevant to modern life, or found on the internet, instead of being passed down”.  I chose this article because I wanted to question this and see if it was true. It states that 1 in 10 children are googling over asking their parents how to do something. So, for our podcast I want to see what skills people have learned from their family members whether it be sewing or cooking skills or how to change a lightbulb and change a tire. This is useful to me as it will want me to find out where different generations of people have learned their skills from. “O’Leary suggests the most important skills to pass on to children these days are how to be a good role model, how to be a good listener, how to express yourself, how to give back, how to multi-task, how to self-soothe, and how to motivate yourself”. With this being said a lot of young people are seen to be entitled and think they do not need these sorts of lessons and skills in their lives. I would like to find out how many people have had these skills passed on by their families to see if they has had time to teach them and interview them on the show and see if they feel the same was as this article.

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/life/features/from-darning-socks-to-making-chutney-how-traditional-skills-are-dying-out-in-family-home-35499830.html

Learning Creative Skills

Creative skills are not seen as important as being able to change a tire or cook a lasagne even in schools the arts are always put down and not taken as seriously as maths and English.  “Creativity and problem solving are among the basic skills that everyone is required to have, whether they have to deal with an everyday problem at home or a work related challenge. But to think outside the box and come up with innovative ideas, we need to use our imagination and see things beyond reality”. It has been proven that for children to grown and learn they need to learn creative skills as it can be a way to express yourself, from creative writing, drama and art.  You learn how to Problem solve, confidence, perseverance, focus and creativity. I was interested to see if people were still interested in creative skills and valued them as much as practical skills.

http://www.1stplace.uk.com/the-importance-of-imagination-and-creativity-in-childrens-development/

“Many people today are rediscovering the pleasures of telling stories, after their culture has lost most of its traditional storytelling, yet cannot easily find out much about the countless millennia of oral traditions with all their wisdom and techniques”. Story telling in African is something that is passed down from the elders, they use it to tell tales of their past. “many old traditions storytelling is synonymous with song, chant, music, or epic poetry, especially in the bardic traditions”. I wondered if people in our country had the same value of storytelling and creating stories so I would like to interview someone who is into creative writing and see if they wish to pass it down too.

http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/dir/traditions/africa.html

Podcast Website

As we have only done radio dramas and live shows, we needed to listen some podcasts to get an insight into what makes an interesting podcast. I found the website Podomatic where 1000’s of podcasts music and talk are uploaded daily. PodOmatic is a free service, that does also offer PRO services for those people who want to take their podcasts to the next level with featured placements, PRO design tools, and expanded storage and bandwidth. You can upload your own or listen to the many which are available online there is many different lengths of shows on here and as ours will be around an hour long it would fit but if not we wanted to put them into 10-15 minute seconds so we could split them up If necessary. The podcast we will make will be informative with an interview that we will then talk about and chat.

https://www.podomatic.com/discovery

Podcast

I found a podcast named The Brayton Birth Method with Dr. Laura Brayton Beyond Your Wildest Genes. “Dr. Laura Brayton is a holistic chiropractor, author, and speaker, passionate about supporting the health and wellness of families. Dr. Brayton writes regularly on health-related topics and is a lecturer for various holistic groups, including at yoga studios, childbirth education centres, and new moms’ groups. She also continues to stay up-to-date and current in her field with frequent post-graduate seminars in functional medicine, nutrition, allergy elimination, paediatrics, and maternity. In addition, Dr. Brayton has received certifications in Chiropractic Paediatrics, Webster Technique for breech presentation, Sacro-Occipital Technique (S.O.T.) and is an advanced level practitioner of Nambudripad’s Allergy Elimination Technique (NAET). Dr . Brayton is a Bioenergetic Practitioner utilizing Applied Kinesiology (manual muscle testing) to “eavesdrop” into the body and determine its current needs for health”. She mentions that she was influenced by her father who was a chiropractor and it was very logical to him and he loved everything it represented so she wanted to do this more because of the environment she was in and form how her dad inspired her. They give their facts and then they have a discussion about it which is how I would like our show to sound like. Over all the podcast is 43:44 this is also close to how long we aim for ours to be. You can tell that it is not scripted and it is just free flow we would want ours to sound like that where we get our thoughts and feelings on the subject we are talking about. She gives her background and how she got to where she is and talks a lot about how she was raised and the influences she had from not using medication and going to a chiropractor to cure her problems from hangovers to falling off her bike.

Podcast Research

By Pass It On Director/Presenter Adam South – 14472597

Podcast Review #1 – ‘Deserter Pubcast Episode 1’, deserter.co.uk – http://deserter.co.uk/2016/10/deserter-pubcast/

Podcast:

• 40:39
• Opening music
• Intro the notion of the series overall
• Intro themselves – self-deprecating, jokey
• Mention recording location explicitly – is this meta? Broadcast radio wouldn’t mention their location particularly
• Highlights of the episode
• Micro pubs
• Chit chat veering on a tangent – light in mood
• The tone and theme seems very; this is two South London blokes having a chat about bloke stuff in a pub.
• Golf comes up within 6 minutes
• Animals
• ‘Deserter philosophy’, ‘Deserter sensibilities’ keeps cropping up, theme, branding – how things relate to the topic of the show / the hosts.
• Humour = organic, presenters jibe one another.
• London centric; Battersea Park, Brockley etc.
• Pub news
• Punctuated by short music stings
• Micro pub background / history
• Drugs
• Social media news roundup
• Beers and ales
• Swearing is allowed
• “Housekeeping” – explicitly mentions/thanks off-mic crew, producer etc., landlord, owner
• Plug themselves at the end, all media platforms
• Thanks & ask for feedback
• Ending music

Platform (website):

• Has branding, with a large “Deserter” logo at the top, and a little slug line with a humorous catch phrase ‘Don’t. Give Up.’
• Logo placed on right in favour of the top left of the screen, typically the first part seen, being dedicated to social media links.
• Search bar
• Facebook ‘Like Us’ link
• Newsletter sign up
• Twitter feed
• The audio plays from a Souncloud widget, underneath which;
• Info about episode
• Follow us on Soundcloud
• Image credits, social media buttons, tags
• Previous / Next episode buttons
• Comments section

Podcast Review #2 – ‘Answer Me This Episode 347: Half An Eyebrow’, answermethispodcast.com – http://answermethispodcast.com

Podcast:

• 55:01
• Intro song, original, amateur, acoustic humour number
• Presenters straight in, don’t introduce right off the bat
• Slightly awkward, amateur-ish humour
• South London again
• Straight into a rambling anecdote, with off-shoots and rants (even looser than previous podcast)
• Male and female = main two presenters
• Male is married
• Tinder jokes
• Swearing acceptable again
• Straight into the format; the presenters debate a question from a listener (pre-prepared – from comments online it seems)
• A third presenter, male, chips in infrequently, less dominant, very poorly edited (has an echo effect on only his segments, like he has been edited in and/or recorded separately – comes off extremely amateurish and awkward)
• Presenter jibe each other quite firmly, makes for a more potentially awkward listen, but nevertheless light in tone and mood.
• Explicit sexual content; e.g. “I’m sure listeners have wanked off to your voice” – seems quite sudden, shocking and out of place; not really tasteful or consistent in tone.
• Awkward self promotional musical stings, like poor corporate ads
• Long talk about some product ‘Square Space’ the presenters are pushing.
• Long pauses frequently
• Tell listener how to send a question at the end, send via website to potentially be featured in following episode
• Outline upcoming side projects
• Outro music, same as intro, fades up during presenters’ end chatter, bit ropey

Platform (website):

• A very jumbled, busy, hard to discern ‘WordPress’ site
• Large branding header image at the top centre; the site actually seems strictly formatted to mobile device portrait – large gaps on left and right column
• As stated, not very visually appealing, the site reads like a jumbled mess, a scrolling feed of self promotion and random streams of consciousness, with links to the podcast episodes bookended by self promotion, ads, and even links to music videos.
• A small search bar, social media buttons, and even a graphic link to a merch store appear top right, but beyond that is mostly ads and self promotion
• Sound runs off ‘Soundcloud’ widget

Podcast Review #3 – ‘Not A Boxer’, Spark Podcasts – http://stories.co.uk/podcasts/not-a-boxer-nira/

Podcast:

• 08:02
• Intro; live, jazzy instrumental music, and an intro dialogue read by multiple contributors/presenters – feels very all encompassing, diverse, exciting and inviting, straight away from this start
• States clearly, this episode is presented by “Nira”.
• Anecdote about Nira’s experience of bigoted views on minorities in the field of advanced mathematics, and PHD’s in general
• Humorous, interjections of audience laughter reactions
• Inspirational story, going against odds, obstacles and expectations to become a successful mathematician
• Very illuminating, felt present in this performance, very engaging podcast!
• Happy ending, Nira got the PHD
• Story continues, still engages, belly laughs from audience, ties up all ends then some
• Ends with the music, thanks for listening, how to feedback and find more ‘Stories’ Podcasts.

Platform (website:)

• Layout very simple and elegant, less is more approach
• Black and white colour scheme, clear, user friendly and approachable
• Tabs at the top to navigate elsewhere around the Spark website
• The page for the podcast simply contains the player (running through ‘Cast’), the title and date of the piece and the presenter, with a short blurb and a thanks below

Summary of podcasts:

Podcast 1 – Deserter;

I felt that this podcast was colloquial, lightly humorous, and reflected the area that the presenters were in well, with a diverse array of local aspects covered, albeit from the bias perspective of the London based presenters – but with affection, comedy and in a somewhat entertaining way. I felt that this was a typical representation for this type of podcast; I felt that the length was appropriate, being not overly long (say if it were an hour plus), or too short for the amount of content they covered. I felt that the discussion between the two worked really well due to their pre-established relationship, working, travelling together etc. These are the elements which I would hope to reflect in our own podcast; a good level of friendly, on the nose banter, highlighting the significance of the locality of our pieces, and a length that feels fit for purpose.

Podcast 2 – Answer Me This;

The second podcast I examined was somewhat disappointing, as I had hoped the presenter might be more relatable, and given their level of experience at podcasting, professional sounding than Deserter – however, in fact, I found the exact opposite to be the case. This podcast didn’t sit well with me for a number of significant reasons, as should be clear from my initial interpretation of an episode, detailed above; in terms of minor grievances, there were technical issues to do with the sound and recording quality of the piece, and the interface of the platform was fairly off putting – majorly though, the tone was inappropriate and all over the place, the show seemed to be paced poorly, rambling at length about uninteresting nonsense with little regard for standard or focus, and the entire piece was punctuated with a souring level of self promotion that felt a bit sickly to my ears, personally.

Unfortunately, these traits can be commonplace across some, more amateurish podcasts – however I did not expect it here, and so was ultimately disappointed. There were not many redeemable qualities in my opinion, and for that reason I found no aspects which I hope to reflect; only what I would class as an example of how not to make a good podcast.

Podcast 3 – Spark Stories;

I enjoyed this final podcast the most out of all of the ones I listened to during my research, for numerous reasons – mainly its simplicity and effectiveness in it’s purpose; to tell stories, with diversity, style, and in an entertaining way. This podcast is inviting, rather than trying to demand the listeners’ attention needlessly, it succeeds mostly where the previous podcast (Answer Me This) fails – the key objective is achieved, it puts across one individual’s story. This instance happened to be the individual Nira, whom (with what sounds like a slight Birmingham accent, and in a live performance environment) proceeds to tell a story that might not necessarily be engaging – one about him achieving his mission to gain a PHD in mathematics, but the presentation is everything. The platform at once, giving practically the entire piece to the performance, allows us to become enchanted in the character of Nira, and caught up with the audience we hear laughing along. The mission statement here is clear, the presenter changing from instance to instance – these are real people, telling real stories; and this podcast’s task is discerning which to present to us. In summary my only qualm with this podcast is simply that there isn’t more to it, as it happily sit listening to similar content I dare say at great length.

What I hope to carry across from this work is the simplicity in communicating the stories and the achievements of others; ideally in as entertaining a way.

Summary of platforms:

Frankly, the best of the podcasts in my view – Spark Stories – has the best looking platform; in terms of aesthetics, it is visually appealing, reflecting the audio in it’s level of clarity and simplicity. The podcast is presented alone, against a black and white, straightforward background, just as the content within, an individual’s story, would be.

The Deserter site was also quite well put together, with a good sense of branding, ease of access and seemed to feature lots of additional content as well as several ways in which to comment and communicate back with the podcast and/or its presenters.

Finally, the least well designed platform was the one associated with Answer Me This – not surprising, the site was far from user friendly, with content laced together in an illogical stream that was less flowing and more of a mish-mash. Furthermore, there was more emphasis on shameless self promotion, and for other podcasts and projects the presenters had going on no less; than the actual episodes of this series.

Ideally, our platform will offer uses a simple, clear, but attractive interface, which presents the audio in a concise and effective way appropriate to our aims and intentions; with room for our potential listeners to fin additional features, content and information, as well as abundant ways to effectively reach out and feedback to us.

Contextual Research

Article 1 – “Creativity Becomes an Academic Discipline”, The New York Times – https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/education/edlife/creativity-becomes-an-academic-discipline.html?_r=0

This article is an in depth look at the formal emergence and emphasis of ‘creativity’ in a traditional academic environment – mostly universities in America; which is relevant to our podcast thematically, in that we are striving to demonstrate that significant, creative as well as practical learning takes place and proper skills are acquired away from the boundaries of the mere classroom.

Part of the article talks of the professional world and businesses as of late putting more weight in the notion of creativeness in general, and applications carried across such as effective problem solving and how creativity translates to a more necessary and useful tool than, for instance, something like critical thinking.

I found a lot of this article useful essentially as an indicator that the premise of our podcast had merit, in my view, the fact that the article’s main takeaway is the prospect of imparting creativity to more practical, everyday situations, stands to vindicate our intended efforts to highlight and showcase how individuals across Lincolnshire have taken it upon themselves, in whatever circumstances, to learn a skill away from formal institutions and curriculums, and to explore the practical and creative elements of our contributors’ efforts.

Article 2 – “Lincoln Pupils Get Advice on School Allotment”, Lincolnshire Echo – http://www.lincolnshirelive.co.uk/lincoln-pupils-expert-advice-creating-allotment/story-15609254-detail/story.html

Originally I looked at this article as part of my research primarily for two reasons; that it was about the passing on of skills, and that it covered elements of crop growing – which is a planned discussion point with one of our contributors, Su Roys.

An aspect I liked about the article was the explanation of why the teachers at the school had elected to teach their students to grow their own fruit and vegetables in the first place; and the importance of learning about produce, and it’s proper origin, how to apply such a skill etc. – as they state, for some of the young pupils, it was as key as moving their perception on from thinking fresh produces starts and ends at the supermarket. This drives home for me the core aspect of pass it on, where the more practical skills we examine through our contributors have a necessity in their being passed on, and how this is different to the more creative side, which could be viewed as less urgent.

Obviously by its nature this article is more lightweight than the others I have looked at in my research – how it remains valid in my work, to aid in the consideration of why passing on skills is evidently so prominent in Lincolnshire, and in a wider sense, what it means to pass on a practical skill, against creative skills.

Article 3 – “Craig Bratley Talks”, The Ransom Note – http://www.theransomnote.com/music/interviews/craig-bratley-talks-exclusive-mix/

Rather than being a formulaic article like the others, this piece was an interview with a subject we have planned to interview for our podcast – Craig Bratley. I considered this piece as almost homework on the subject I knew that I would be interviewing personally, to get a deeper sense of his character, but also ideas about subjects he is comfortable and apt at discussing, and to gain more experience of how to approach phrasing questions aimed at a DJ, and the notion of that as a creative and practical skill.

I found this piece informative, and simultaneously quite relaxed in its flow, as is the typical manner of colloquial interviews with musicians for entertainment/journalistic purposes – and I got a good sense of Craig’s character as a focused, informed, and experienced local talent, with a deep knowledge and passion for what he does, but with a lighter side open to humorous banter and more comical exchanges and anecdotes. Hopefully this will factor in when I formulate my questions for the podcast interview – my hope is that I can tailor the knowledge I have gained to make the piece appropriately natural, warm, open to light humour – but also engaging and relevant to his skills as an artist.

Each member of the team did some research to help with the project. This was done before and during the production of our piece, to help give us inspiration but also find out how a podcast should be formatted. We had no legal or ethical issues to research, which is rather different from our drama last semester which required an extensive insight into these areas. We did however need to research the genre, which is of course podcasts and this was done by listening to some, while our audience research came about by examining how podcast sites were designed. The topic research was done by analysing articles that looked at how people could learn skills and pass them on. In terms of technical research, we didn’t really need to look into anything as all we needed to use was a zoom microphone, a standard studio set up, and adobe audition. We did occasionally require help in the studio as there were sometimes technical faults that were beyond our control, but the only real thing in terms of research was the range of different mic set ups that Dylan talked us through, which can be seen below.

Article Looking At Example of Creative Skills Being Learnt/Passed On

To get a good idea of how our podcast should sound, it is important to research some information before hand, and by looking at articles it will give a good insight into key examples that could in theory be turned into a podcast. The article that I looked at was from The Guardian, written by Martin Williams which is called “What’s the best way to teach languages?”

As soon as I found this article, I knew it would be useful because it focuses on the whole idea of teaching people things, which is the aim of our podcast, whether it’s in the form of learning it yourself, or being taught how to do something. The key element that is evident in this article is the idea of motivation, and the way in which inspiration works, with “the UK’s most multi-lingual student speaking 11 languages” (Williams, 2013) saying it is all down to the fact that he wanted to converse with any individual in the world in their native language.

As well as this, Luca Lampariello who speaks 12 languages, as well as being a language consultant says that languages “can only be learnt” (Williams, 2013) as opposed to them being taught. This means that teachers at schools are only there to motivate students with more interactive tasks nowadays, which will inspire them to learn outside of school too, which could be done by watching things such as foreign films.

Interviewing anyone from this article would obviously be an ideal element for any podcast, especially one that looks at passing on skills which is the whole idea of our project. This is because there are so many individuals that have a great passion and interest in learning languages, which would give them motivation to help teach the skill to other people in the future. This is highlighted by Richard Simcott, who is a hyper polyglot – which basically means a talented person who can learn a lot of languages very quickly. Richard “has studied more than 30 languages and can converse in around 20 of them”, which all begun when he was very young, and he would use platforms such as books, music and other interactive media to learn these.

Overall then, this article was ideal for the inspiration behind our piece, because we decided to use an individual who had taught herself English as a second language, so reading this piece before interviewing her would give us a range of questions to ask, such as why they taught themselves English, how they did it, and whether they would enjoy passing on the skill.

https://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2013/may/14/best-way-teach-language-schools

Article Looking At Example of Practical Skills Being Learnt/Passed On

Although creative skills are always very impressive, practical skills have arguably even a bigger impact, because these are perhaps easier to pass on. Whilst individuals tend to be born with skills such as singing and writing, practical activities such as sports, cooking and family run businesses have a very tight interlink in the sense that teaching and learning is happening almost simultaneously. This meant that it would be useful to look at an article on an example of this, and I found a piece on Jamie Oliver’s website that was written by cookbook author Jody Vassallo which is called “Cooking together – a family tradition”.

This article immediately grabbed my attention, not only does the first bit “cooking together” strongly imply that there is a great deal of communication going on, the second bit helps emphasise this further by pointing out the family tradition, which basically confirms that there is an element of passing on happening, which is exactly the meaning of our podcast. The very first thing that she mentions is how that this tradition of passing on has been occurring for years and years, which means by nature it is always going to happen in almost any traditional family. Many centuries ago, mums would teach their daughters how to cook, and Jody refuses to believe that this tradition is dying. She says that she keeps this tradition alive by making as many friends as possibly in her local town, and will always seek out individuals if she is aware of them owning an interesting recipe. Not only is it “preserving a precious piece of history” (Vassallo, 2014), but it also allows her to get to know people, so whilst the tradition is still being maintained, individuals are able to build friendships as a result. From a personal point of view, I was taught by my grandmother how to cook various desserts, and Jody mentions this in her article, with people always telling her stories.

While this helps proves that the passing on of recipes is still strong, she also mentions at the end of the article how someone from her yoga class “adapted her mum’s recipe to use the local macadamias” to cook her own baklava. This brief point shows how the girl learnt the recipe off her mum while in her home country Lebanon, and was able to change this recipe slightly when moving to the UK.

This article was therefore very useful for our piece, because it helped us understand just how important cooking can be, not only in terms of tradition, but also through the enjoyment that can come through learning the activity. We are also going to interview a woman who is part of a family who pass on traditions of food, and focus on the aspect of “make do and mend” – which also links back to the article as Jody mentions how her friends always leave her food, which she can turn into a range of dishes.

http://www.jamieoliver.com/news-and-features/features/a-family-tradition/

Podcast Website Research – TED Talks

While last semester it was necessary to research radio stations such as BBC Radio 4 or Siren FM for our radio drama, our podcast this semester would probably fit onto a website where a range of podcasts are available, given that they are part of a genre where almost all the content is niche, and more specifically sought after than dramas, which appeal to a broader, less specific audience. This is backed up by the definition of a podcast which is – “a digital audio or video file or recording, usually part of a themed series, that can be downloaded from a website to a media player or computer” (Dictionary, 2017).

One of these websites is TED Talks, “a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks” (TED, 2017). It is already apparent that our piece – “Pass It On”, would not be out of place on a website on this – not only is it short (15 minute per podcast), but it also spreads ideas – the whole idea of our project is to pass on people’s skills, and by listening to the podcast, the audience may be inspired by a talent that someone possesses, and therefore want to try something new themselves. In their mission statement, they state that they want “to change attitudes, lives and, ultimately, the world” as well as making “great ideas accessible” (TED, 2017) and sparking discussion.

Therefore, it is evident from their short, but effective “about” section, that a podcast like ours, which focuses on the idea of learning, honing, and passing on a talent, would work very well on a website like this.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/podcast

https://www.ted.com/about/our-organization

Podcast Research – TED Talks – Eduardo Briceno: How to get better at the things you care about

Seeing as I researched the TED Talks website, and was able to make some conclusions from the “about” section, I thought it would be necessary to listen to one of the podcasts to see if my conclusions were correct. The podcast that I watched was a short speech from a man who explained how people could improve at things that they cared about in life, such as a job, hobby, or relationship. Already, we can tell that this will be about spreading ideas, while it also complies with their mission statement, as the aim is to help change people’s views towards the things they care about. He mentions that it is common for people to always try their best in life, but it can be hard for them to get better at the things they want to improve at. The main thing he focuses on is for a good balance between learning and performing – you need to learn how to improve at certain activities, whilst performing this activity in the best way that you can. This balance therefore helps an individual transfer these improvements into their next performance, which could be common in an area such as singing or acting. The issue he picks up on is that most people spend time performing without learning, because they think that their adequate standard is good enough already, and are scared of making mistakes while learning. Finally, the 4 main pointers to succeeding is to believe, want to improve, know how to improve, while being in a low mistake situation.

This piece was an inspiration for our project because the way Eduardo spoke was so motivating and powerful, this meant that we wanted our contributors to all have something unique, which would make the audience feel inspired, and not just settle for second best, but to try new things and perhaps change their lives.  The fact that only one individual was present in this podcast meant that with 5 participants in ours, we could easily recreate the feeling that the audience would feel from this TED Talks piece, which to me was a good balance between humour, but significant realisation about what can happen if we work very hard in life.

https://www.ted.com/talks/eduardo_briceno_how_to_get_better_at_the_things_you_care_about