CHAMPAIGN – Want to know what's important to eighth-graders? Listen to their podcasts.

For Dunia Nadhimi, it's wearing her head scarf, part of her identity as a Muslim. It's not easy being the only girl wearing a scarf in her school. She didn't like the way the other kids looked at her at first, but now most are accepting.

"I say all that really changed was my clothing. ... I believe that now it is who I am. And no one can change that," she says in her podcast.

Dunia's classmates at Jefferson Middle School believe in the joy of music, that they'll someday play in the NBA, in life after cancer, in the ghosts in a grandmother's house.

Students in Jefferson drama teacher Mandy Williams' class listened to essays from National Public Radio's "This I Believe" series. They talked about how they form their beliefs and how that makes them who they are.

Then they wrote their own essays and recorded them for podcasts, with the help of Geoff Freymuth, who oversees instructional technology at Jefferson. The podcasts are posted on Jefferson's Web site, at www.champaignschools.org/jefferson/index.html.

The essays are just one way the school is using podcasts. Principal Susan Zola started with updates about happenings at Jefferson, as a way to keep parents informed.

Then Williams' drama club used podcasts to document their Cabaret Night production last November, with interviews with the performers. A group of students calling themselves the "Pod Squad" is documenting the spring musical, including first-person narratives about auditioning.

Jefferson's sixth-grade AVID class – a program to help prepare middle and high school students in the academic middle for college – recently completed "Our City" podcasts on various aspects of Champaign.

English teacher Susan Huffman asked her students to research a current topic that was important to them and do a podcast on the issue, in the form of a news report. Some are now being made into videocasts.

The students say it's more fun than just writing a paper.

"You get to use more technology instead of just going to the computer lab and just typing," said Antonio Mapson. "You get to record on real microphones like you would do if you were singing, and you get to record videos."

"It's more active," added Jonathan Sherrick.

The two have been shooting video for Jonathan's newscast on school funding and how it affects learning. Antonio reported on the idea of making medical marijuana available in vending machines. Dunia and Chase Lipscomb discussed the presidential race.

Huffman planned to show the completed videos during parent-teacher conferences last Friday.

While the content was the most important part of the assignment, Huffman also wants to use technology that is relevant to her students.

The challenge, Freymuth said, is getting teachers to use technology that may not be familiar or comfortable to them. He hopes the projects completed so far will inspire more teachers to use podcasting and other technology.

"The kids are already there," he said. "They have this technology at home. They use it all the time. They download their songs. The kids are the (digital) natives. The teachers are the immigrants."

Zola said the technology is another way for teachers to reach children with different learning styles. Freymuth and Huffman say they've seen students who usually perform poorly on written assignments work hard on writing for their podcasts.

"A lot of them really shined," Freymuth said.

"It's so exciting to see what students are able to do, and watch the students that were more reticent, more quiet, be able to blossom," Huffman added. "It's been a highly rewarding project."

Other Champaign schools are doing podcasts now too. Franklin Middle School Principal Angela Smith and the Central High School band program posted their first podcasts on their schools' Web sites in January.