How I made a school podcast
During the second lockdown, I had the idea to create a school podcast during home learning, that was created with content sourced from our school community. Upon reflection of the first lockdown, I was proud of the music resources I had produced, and felt they were useful for the few already engaged with home learning, however it missed out those who needed that extra support or were not already actively learning through support at home.
The idea was to create a podcast for our school community by our school community, to support wellbeing and keep a sense of togetherness during home learning. I pitched this to our Headteacher, who was on board for me to go ahead. I then met with some of the keyworker children on-site to design the project and create an advert for their peers at home.
As most of us were at home whilst contributing to this project, we relied heavily on google classroom. Once I shared the advert on google classroom, I also recorded and shared a how to record audio and upload it. There was also an option to send in video, which I would edit and strip the audio for the podcast. I sometimes was able to include the on-site keyworker children by recording their contributions in a circle time style setting. I was pleased that another class teacher on-duty during lockdown did the same for the podcast.
The project ran for just over 5 weeks, and production of the podcast was very time consuming as I was the sole editor. Each week I would come up with a big question, often to do with a wider school focus e.g. Book Week, or to foster ideas for improving wellbeing whilst at home. I would then pitch segment ideas relevant to each key stage, in the form of an assignment, giving each child the opportunity to pick one they wanted to contribute to and upload using their usual methods for google classroom. I then extended the involvement of regular contributors, giving them special assignments to record a welcome, or the big question, or introduce a segment, often also recording audio feedback for them individually. I would also email staff segment ideas, and came up with an idea for a virtual staffroom on google classroom, so we could share opportunities in a similar way to the virtual classes. The main one they contributed to was ‘Old School Days’, where they shared their experiences of school with our school community and gave an encouraging word.
Each week I used Logic Pro X to edit each episode, sourcing background music from YouTube or Splice Audio, or my own original music or sometimes beats made by my brother. I then mixed each episode using tutorials on how to edit podcasts from YouTube. I then sent it to our Head, who would have it uploaded onto our school website. The segment options were sent out by Friday, and I had to have the episode to the Head by Wednesday morning, so the deadline was always quite tight but I made each one! I also then went onto to do live singing assemblies on Wednesday mornings – I do not recommend that schedule.
My favourite episode is episode 3. I could hear my production skills were improving, and I loved the poem our data administrator wrote and shared, I also love that it ended with an original music mix by one of our class teachers who is also a radio DJ in his spare time. I wrote and recorded a jingle to a melody that one of our year 1 students sang for our recurring segment ‘Old School Days’, which features in the last two episodes as well. You can listen to any of the episodes here.
Upon reflection, I could have done more to promote the episodes once they were released, and perhaps given more opportunities for children to listen at home. Each episode was shared on the classes on google classroom, but perhaps they could have been emailed to parents as well, or a perhaps competition announced to encourage more listeners. It would have been great to have the podcasts on a podcast platform, perhaps one for children, but due to lack of time or research we didn’t go ahead with that this time around. It would have been good to give the contributors a chance to assess and reflect on their contribution as well, and how they could improve next time.
The project on a whole however, was a success in bringing together voices from across the school community – teaching and administrative staff, parents and students. Students shared their favourite foods and recipes, their favourite books and movies, parents interviewed their children and teachers confessed just how well behaved they really were at school! It was a great insight into the lives of our community members, an opportunity for them to step out of their comfort zones, and a steep learning curve for all involved.
I feel the podcast as a project also has the potential to be a permanent fixture perhaps for extra-curricular activities and hopefully with not just myself producing it! Students were able to learn about creating appropriate online content to a deadline, collaborate creatively on a project, develop their public speaking skills and technical skills (recording their voices and uploading it often independently), sharing ideas, thoughts, opinions, and reviews, and developed their listening skills. A few students who typically were quiet and reserved in class became regular contributors and feature presenters on the podcast, which was a surprising but pleasant outcome. With a bit more time and support, students could learn to edit the episodes and upload and promote them, even designing the segments and writing sentence starters and developing their reporting, reviewing and interviewing skills.
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