Designing Weather Podcasts with Grade 2 Students

Podcasting offers an empowering way for students of all ages to express their ideas and connect with the world in an authentic way. Podcasting gives students opportunities to interview people and share their interest and curiosity for a topic. Practicing speaking and listening to voices through the medium of podcasting also provides a challenging and creative way for our students to improve their oracy. For the last few weeks, Grade 2 students and teachers have found that this medium allows for the creation of an enriching learning experience. By following the structure of the PYP Design cycle, group work, and listening and writing scaffolds, Grade 2 students become prepared to make their first podcasts, which directly relate to their Unit of Inquiry, “How the World Works” and its Central Idea that “Understanding weather patterns helps people make informed choices.” Our goal for this project is to learn how podcasts can help us to develop and communicate our ideas about weather patterns to the Branksome community. 

After we explored and analyzed some youth friendly episodes, the students were ready to try planning their own. Together, in podcasting teams, the students chose production roles and started planning their first interview segment with members of our community. We brainstormed questions together as a class and then fine tuned the list through voting and discussion to choose the most suitable questions. In addition, the kids practiced some interpersonal skills, like how to greet their guest with a smile and eye contact, and how to be respectful and confident. They recorded themselves using the podcasting application ‘Anchor’ which we found to be very student-friendly. This activity also increased their technology skills, as they tested different features of the application. In the coming lessons, Grade 2 students will be developing the personal style of their podcast through music, sounds, and other show segments.

The process of learning podcasting has given our Grade 2 students voice and choice in how they decide to express their understanding of weather conditions and this experience has developed their growth mindset as they make changes and improve their writing and speaking skills based on the immediate feedback that voice recording allows. When students show what they know via podcasts, they can revisit the ideas and concepts included in their podcast script. The medium thus helps motivate and engage them as they reflect on and share their learning with others. We anticipate sharing these audio experiences with the Branksome community soon.

Elizabeth Gasparini
Learning Technology Integrator