Making Small Talk – Audio MP3 Files Made More Portable

A recent article by Merry and Orsmond (2008) in this journal has highlighted the provision of student feedback as audio MP3 files. The authors report positive student engagement with this mode of feedback delivery but highlight one drawback as being large file sizes (up to 11Mb) that under certain circumstances prohibit sending by email. In some cases feedback had to be sent to students on CD. The authors speculate that adjusting recording parameters may be one way of overcoming this problem but were wary to do should the lower quality detract from the student listening experience.