Marshall Kirkpatrick gives us a very nice discussion of what he does when teaching RSS to people. Teaching RSS: A Discussion
Of all of the Web2.0 tools I know of, I think that RSS is one of the most difficult to explain to new users. I’ve been doing a lot of explaining lately - in trainings, blog posts and work proposals. I thought I’d put my current thinking down in text and see if others are interested in contributing their thoughts as well.
He sets up a demonstration account at a web-based aggregator, and he gets suggestions from the trainees on what news services they normally read, so the demo is relevant to the trainees. If he has time, he also demonstrates blog search, and tagging (del.icio.us). And he even spends a little time talking about approaches to reading.
[found through the Corante Web Hub, of which I am a member.]