Alan Kim | The Roanoke Times

McKayla Dulaney gets a good laugh out of a practice voice recording of Sarah St. Jean (foreground) during a summer class for editing audio and preparing podcasts at Christiansburg Elementary School.

By Thursday, Angela Williams hopes her group of rising fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders think about the self-confidence, writing and technology skills they've picked up during her summer class, too.

Williams is teaching students to create podcasts -- audio or video programs delivered via computers and MP3 players -- through a program offered by the Montgomery County schools' office of gifted education.

The eight students in her class came from schools around the county and plunked down $40 to practice what Williams taught her own fourth-grade class to do last school year.

Williams is one of two teachers at Christiansburg Elementary School who last year piloted the state's Learning without Boundaries program. The project, organized in part by Radford University, Virginia Tech and Apple, put the iPod Touch and other wireless electronics devices in students' hands to find out how effective they are as teaching tools.

The state's program was launched in April, but Williams said she'd asked about using such devices in her classroom at least a year before because she'd seen wireless teaching resources at conferences.

The technology can help students reach their individual potentials, instead of making them strive for a common goal, Williams said.

Last week, a Virginia Tech doctoral student won a statewide competition after he designed a math application to use on wireless devices.

The goal of it all is for the game-like programs to spark students' interest and become commonplace in classrooms.

"This is a really good incentive for kids who aren't good at reading or writing," Williams said.

She said some of her students last school year didn't want to write podcast scripts but agreed to help her find audio to accompany the classmate's words. Those reluctant students quickly got excited and wanted to write their own, she said.

Last year, her students simply wrote scripts, but they did not record them.

This summer, students are using an audio-editing program called Audacity, which Williams said they've easily learned.

Rising fifth-grader Sarah St. Jean said Williams' regular class sparked her interest in the summer session. Her classroom was adjacent to Williams' and periodically she "played with iPods."

Sarah said she asked her mother to attend the class so she could do some more of that playing. Even though students aren't actually working with an MP3 player, Sarah said she's having a blast.

"It's a lot more fun than I thought it would be," she said.

Sarah created two pig characters for her podcasts and said she hopes to continue their story lines in future broadcasts once she gets her own music player.

Giving students that level of control can help bring them out of their shells and bolster their creativity, Williams said.

"It gives them a lot of choices, "she said.

Williams said she hopes to keep going with her podcasting lessons in the fall. She said she sees the audio-editing software as an alternative form for students' book reports and projects.