Final Thoughts (Coco Ang, W14)

I’m finally finished my podcast!! I am definitely happy with my podcast considering that I don’t have an actual microphone and that this is the first time I have ever recorded anything! Looking back on this project, I realize that I have learned so much, especially since I am not very good with technology. I mean come on! I learned how to create an entire podcast episode from scratch! Aside from the recording and editing aspect, I have also learned many new skills and techniques to efficiently research any given topic. Although this project was extremely challenging and intimidating, I am glad I stuck with it because I have learned so many new skills that I can use outside of this class!

If I had more time or the chance to go back and do something differently, there are a few things I’d change. For starters, I would have gotten a microphone! I think (and I’m still not sure about this) that having a mic would have helped me get rid of the echo-ish sound I have in my podcast. Also, I would learn more about the recording software (Audacity) that I used. Audacity has lots of effects and tools that I have absolutely no idea how to use. If I had plenty more time, I would have learned to use each of these tools and this may have enhanced my podcast.

For all you future students, my message would be to not be intimidated and get started as soon as possible! This project will take much longer than you think! Although this seems like a huge project, don’t stress out too much about it. Just take it one step at a time! By the end of it, you’ll realize how much you’ll have learned and feel pretty good about how much you’ve accomplished!

Good luck everyone!

To Pee or Not to Pee (Coco Ang, W14)

Imagine this: you’re finally at the all-inclusive beach-front resort you’ve always dreamed of going to. Whether it be Jamaica, Cuba, Costa Rica or Mexico, the weather is just perfect and the beach looks absolutely gorgeous. So obviously, you decide to go out for a swim. You’re having a wonderful time and enjoying the water, but all of a sudden you feel something brush against your leg. You then feel an intense stinging pain followed by a burning sensation. You look down at the water and you see what appears to be, a translucent floating blob. You immediately get out of the water and you notice that the skin over the painful area is inflamed and irritated. You quickly think to yourself, “Shoot, I’ve just been stung by a jellyfish!” So would you do in this situation? Well, there is a common notion that people should urinate on a jellyfish sting. But, is there is even any truth behind this? Would urine even work? Isn’t there a more sanitary and pleasant alternative? If you’d like some information on how to deal with a jellyfish sting, and maybe save yourself some future embarrassment, tune into my episode which will address these questions and much more!

Software (Coco Ang, W14)

I will be using a software called GarageBand to both record and edit my episode. After trying out this program, I absolutely love it! What really attracted me to this program is the ease of moving around different segments and creating new sound clips. Another great feature of GarageBand is that it allows users to include sounds that come with the program without violating any copyright laws! The only downside I have noticed about this program is that it is only available for Apple products.

If you would like to learn more about this program and download it, click the link below to bring you to their official website.

Apple - GarageBand

I have also come across excellent tutorial videos from YouTube that has definitely helped me thus far.

GarageBand Tutorial for Beginners - 5 Things You Need To Know

This is a great video to start off your GarageBand career! As the title suggests, it tells you 5 things that you need to know about GarageBand. These 5 things will help you out with the fundamentals of the program. It also has links in their description box for more detailed tutorials!

Garage Band (Beginner Tutorial) HD Tutorial #1

This next video is fairly longer than the 1^st video; however, it provides you with much more information that you will need once you get started. It gives a great step-by-step tutorial for many of the functions you may want to use in your podcast. If you like this video, there’s 2 more parts that will definitely make you a GarageBand expert!

Here are some tips that I have learned thus far that you may find useful:

-          When recording, make sure you have turned off any applications that may have pop-ups, including your cell phone! This is especially the case if you are using the built-in microphone on your MacBook. The mic on the MacBook is fairly good at picking up extraneous noise!

-          Remember to trim off the silent portions at the beginning and end of each individual segment that your episode is composed of. This will allow your audience to avoid listening to long awkward silences.

-          If you have multiple Mac computers, you can use iCloud to sync your GarageBand session across all your computers!

So far, I have not had any problems with GarageBand and I have a pretty good feeling about composing my entire episode. I have been able to record small segments of my episode as well as create short sound clips without much difficulty. If I do come up with any issues, there are countless tutorials on YouTube that will be able to help me out!

After listening to some recordings of myself, I am definitely not too thrilled about my voice! To fix this, I will try to simply change my voice or find a way to adjust my voice through GarageBand. 

Structure (Coco Ang, W14)

My podcast follows the “All Things Considered” structure. It starts off with a scene from the Friends episode, “The One with the Jellyfish” which is represented by the straight line at the beginning of the drawing.

This straight line is then followed by a 'dip,’ which looks like a ‘U’. This dip represents the core part of my podcast which includes what a jellyfish sting is, whether or not urine is a useful remedy and how to treat a sting.

Following the dip is a return to the straight line, which represents a return to the scene from Friends that was introduced in the beginning of my podcast.

My podcast structure does follow the typical structure of Everyday Einstein, the podcast that I am emulating.  Usually, Everyday Einstein will also begin with a short story that leads into the central part of their segment; similarly, this will include information about a scientific topic. Their podcast segment then finishes by returning back to that story. A good example from Everyday Einstein that follows this structure is “Should You Store Batteries in the Freezer?”

In regards to the number of citations in episode 102 “Icon for Access,” I have counted 22 citations.

Search Strategies (Coco Ang, W14)

Boolean logic is basically a strategy you can use to make your researching career a lot easier! More specifically, it is when you use the terms, AND, NOT and OR to help narrow down or broaden up your search.

AND is used to narrow down your search by only looking for sources that contain the terms that you have linked with AND.

NOT is also used to narrow down your search. It does so by looking for sources that do not contain the specified term(s).

OR is used to broaden up your search by looking for sources that contain the terms you have linked with OR.

For example, take a look at the following search phrase:

“chocolate” AND “milk OR dark” NOT “white”

This search would give us sources that contain the terms, “milk” or “dark”, as well as sources with, “chocolate.” However, this search would not show any sources that contain the term “white.”

For more information, you can visit this website which further explains the use of these terms!

This search strategy has helped me find great sources for my podcast! For example, initially I had intended on using the National Institutes of Health database to look for my sources because I thought that using this database would help me narrow down my search. However, after using the Boolean search terms, I found great sources that were directly related to my topic from a search on Google! Even though Google has a huge reach, I was able to focus my search with these 3 little terms.

Since I have had such a successful experience with Boolean logic, I will definitely be using it again! I also recommend that everyone should try using it as well!

Digging Deeper (Coco Ang, W14)

So far, I have more closely read and taken notes on the sources I had located when writing my Initial Research Plan.

I have found a scholarly article that examines the efficacy of an agent used to prevent jellyfish stings. Its citation is:

- Boulware, D. R. (2006). A randomized, controlled field trial for the prevention of jellyfish stings with a topical sting inhibitor. Journal of Travel Medicine, 13(3), 166-171.

I don’t think I will be using much scholarly sources, in fact I am beginning to question using this article because it doesn't seem to fit in with the tone of my podcast. However, if I do use other scholarly sources they will most likely be similar to the one that I have found where they will focus on testing new agents to prevent jellyfish stings.

I have also found several popular sources:

- WebMD. (2013, October 25). Jellyfish Sting Treatment. Retrieved on February 6^th, 2014 from: http://www.webmd.com/first-aid/jellyfish-stings-treatment

- Drobina, B. J. (2008, April 29). Jellyfish Stings. Retrieved on February 6^th, 2014 from: http://www.emedicinehealth.com/jellyfish_stings/article_em.htm

- Mayo Clinic. (2011, September 1). Jellyfish Stings. Retrieved on February 6^th, 2014 from: http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/jellyfish-stings/basics/definition/con-20034045

- Brouhard, R. (2014, January 24). Will urine relieve the pain of a jellyfish sting? Retrieved on February 6^th, 2014 from: http://firstaid.about.com/od/bitesstings/f/07_JellyfishPee.htm

These popular sources were written by qualified medical professionals.

After more carefully reading through these popular sources, I'm not too sure if I will be looking for any more sources because I feel relatively confident that this is an excellent list. This is because when applying the CRAAP test, they seem to meet all the set criteria! Also, there is lots of agreement within their content which is always a good sign!

My next steps will be collaborating each of their information on identifying a jellyfish sting, why urine is not an effective treatment, the true way of dealing with a sting and ways to prevent a jellyfish sting!

Topic Refinement (Coco Ang, W14)

To be quite honest, I don’t think that the pitch exercise helped refine my topic as I had already had a focused topic in mind. However, I do believe that this pitch exercise would be very useful in other writing assignments because it forces you to explain exactly what you intend on discussing in your assignment in a very short amount of time (4 minutes). In order for you to do so, it requires you to have a really good handle on what your topic is, rather than just having a “general idea.”

For my podcast, I will be saving many people from future embarrassment by debunking the common myth of using urine as a treatment for jellyfish stings, as well as discussing the correct treatment protocols they should take!

Pitching (Coco Ang, W14)

After doing lots of research on pitching, these are the sources that I have deemed reliable and useful.

1. How to Perfect your Pitch

I think that this source is reliable because it seems professionally created and has over 78,000 readers. Although this website was intended to give career advice, this specific website provides excellent tips on creating an elevator pitch that can be applied to our pitch presentations. A great tip from this website was that our pitch should be conversational in nature and not like a robot!

2. How to Pitch an Idea

I found this source to be reliable because of its author's (Scott Berkun) credentials. This article was actually extrapolated from one of Scott's 5 books that he has written. Just to list a few of his many credentials: he is an experienced speaker, blogger for Harvard Business, taught at University of Washington, and appeared on CNN.

This article discussed the importance of knowing your audience members and to formulate your pitch around their perspectives in order to keep their interests! Another great tip was to practice, practice, practice! Do so in front of many different people to get as much feedback (positive or negative) as possible.

3. Radio Pitch Guide (CBC)

This is a guide from CBC discussing some tips and guidelines if you wanted to pitch an idea to CBC. As a national news station, I feel that its credentials speaks for itself. A great tip from this guide was to listen to other shows from CBC. Although we are not pitching to CBC, we can use this tip based on the podcast that we are trying to emulate. In order to impress the producers at our aimed podcast, we need to present our ideas in a way that reflects their general theme.

Based on all the advice I have gathered, I need to do more research about my podcast (Everyday Einstein) and their target audience. Researching Everyday Einstein will allow me to tailor my pitch in a way that will appeal to the producers of Everyday Einstein. For example, I have noticed that the general tone of this podcast is quite light and comedic, which is exactly the tone I will use for my pitch. By researching their target audience, I can further refine my podcast pitch such that the producers will notice that my episode will not only capture the attention of their current viewers, but attract more listeners. For instance, the topic I have chosen for my podcast is, “What should we really do after being stung by a jellyfish?” After learning more about Everyday Einstein and their target audience, I will need to incorporate scientific explanations in my podcast. This is because the target audience of Everyday Einstein enjoys learning about science.

My plan is to then practice presenting my pitch in front of as many people as possible! This will allow me to get lots of feedback and constructive criticism as well as better familiarizing myself with my script. By doing so, my pitch will come across as conversational, helping me keep the attention of my audience.

Topic Selection (Coco Ang, W14)

After listening to various episodes from Everyday Einstein, I have decided that this is the podcast that I will emulate. I have chosen this podcast it uses science to explain our world in a simple and meaningful way. For example, it uses science to answers questions like, “Why is the sky blue?” and, “Why do glasses get foggy in cold weather?” As a person who is very interested in science, I feel that this is the perfect podcast to emulate. I really enjoy listening to this podcast because it is very funny and uses an anecdote to start off most of its episode. Since these are the main reasons that keep my attention while listening to Everyday Einstein, I would also like to include these aspects in my own episode.

Recently, I have been very interested in various common scientific misconceptions and I have noticed that Everyday Einstein actually speaks about these as well. For example, in its episode, “Should You Store Batteries in the Freezer?” it debunked the common belief that we should keep batteries in our freezers to extend its shelf life! For my podcast I would also like to challenge a common misconception. More specifically, would like to answer the question of, “What should we really do after being stung by a jellyfish?” I feel that this question captures the theme of Everyday Einstein and it will also keep the audience’s attention.

After looking at some advice from Spark (Student Papers & Academic Research Kit), it was much easier for me to pick a topic. At first I was very overwhelmed with the idea of selecting a topic but Spark helps guide you through the process in a very simple manner. It also gives various resources like, Brainstorming, Nutshelling and Plus, Minus Interesting (PMI) which I found very useful. I found the Nutshelling resource most useful because it really helped me narrow down my topic and keep me focused on what exactly I want to accomplish through my podcast.

The advice I would give to others is to definitely use the resources that Spark gives us. Although we likely walk through these steps intuitively, these resources allow us to keep track of our ideas! I find this particularly important because this way, if we forget a key aspect of our topic, we can just refer back to these resources!

Introductions (Coco, W14)

Hello everyone, my name is Coco and yes this is my real name! I am currently in my final year in Kinesiology and I am interested in studying human biomechanics. Having spent countless hours in scientific laboratories (in paediatric and spine labs), my familiarity of research is mainly in the scientific realm. Thus, I was very intrigued when Professor Bell mentioned that we conduct research in our day-to-day lives without even realizing it. I would definitely like to broader my understanding of research and learn as many tips as possible for becoming a better researcher!

I have never used information management software but I am excited to learn how to! The main research tool that I currently use for research is Web of Science. I believe that this is a great academic tool as it allows you to easily browse through various research articles regarding a similar topic. A fun tool that I use in my free time is one that is growing increasingly popular today, Reddit. This tool is a great source of information that has forum for just about ANY topic you are interested in!

I do not have any experience with radio or podcasting so I am definitely feeling very intimated (and somewhat excited) about creating a podcast episode! For my episode, I am interested in emulating Everyday Einstein.  After listening to a few episodes by Everyday Einstein, I feel that this is the perfect podcast to emulate. This podcast explains topics in science that may be difficult to understand in a simple and meaningful way, as well as giving us tips on how to use science in our everyday lives!