ql-align-justify">As a future Filipino teacher, one curriculum practice I find powerful in connecting audio/oral meanings to reading and writing is a “Podcast Interview to Written Feature Article” activity for Junior High School Araling Panlipunan or Filipino, it is like journalism. In this practice, students record a short podcast-style interview with a community member such as a schoolmate who’s in a higher position, parent, local health worker, or barangay elder about a relevant topic like disaster preparedness or local traditions. Afterward, they transform the oral recording into a written feature article. This resource allows students to experience firsthand how meaning shifts across modes, illustrating the multimodal literacy principles described in the lesson.

First, the activity highlights the dimension of referring, as students learn that audio and oral meanings rely on prosody, the pitch, volume, emphasis, pauses that carry emotional and symbolic meaning. For example, a trembling voice when recounting a flood evacuation conveys fear and urgency, which cannot be fully captured in plain text. When students convert this into written form, they must interpret, select, and re-represent meaning, demonstrating the lesson’s argument that writing is not merely a transcription of speech (Cope & Kalantzis, 2017). This mode‑shifting helps deepen comprehension because it requires conceptualizing meaning differently. Second, the activity illustrates dialogue, since recording an interview positions the learner as a listener who must negotiate turn-taking and ask follow‑up questions. The written article then positions the student as an author addressing a distant reader is an example of how oral and written modes configure social relationships differently. To explain more of this, I can integrate a class discussion board where students post a short audio excerpt and receive written peer feedback. This removes the limits of traditional IRE (Initiate‑Respond‑Evaluate) classroom talk and encourages broader participation. Third, the dimension is structure. Oral speech is spontaneous, repetitive, and filled with hesitations, while writing requires explicit organization and coherence, such as crafting a lead, body, and concluding insight. By transforming an interview into a polished article, students experience the cognitive shift described by Kress (2010) from oral “thinking aloud” to writing that is condensed, explicit, and abstract.

Also, the practice also demonstrates the situation, since students hear accents, linguistic choices, and cultural expressions typical of Filipino communities. When they shift this into a written genre, they must determine how to respectfully and accurately contextualize situated oral meanings for a public audience. And also the intent becomes clear when comparing the two modes. The podcast aims to document lived experience, while the article aims to inform, persuade, or reflect. Students write a short reflection on what meanings changed during the shift, what was gained (clarity, analysis) and what was lost (tone, emotion). This metacognitive step reinforces multimodal awareness. Overall, this curriculum practice addresses the topic effectively, makes strong use of media accessible to Filipino learners, and offers innovative, culturally relevant ways to integrate audio/oral and written literacy development.

From Voice to Text: Transforming Podcast Interviews into Written Feature Articles