Resources >> School Radio Lesson Ideas

Here are a few ideas on how you could use your School Radio system to provide creative, informative lessons.

Creating Jingles & Clocks  (playlist for your show)

Creating jingles, sweepers or promos are fundamental to radio and 'clocks' are used to plan the structure. The document below offers some advice on how to approach creating content for your radio station and also how typical radio shows are structured. Click on the link below to download.

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Other Lesson Ideas

Make An Advert - Individuals or groups of children are tasked with creating a radio advert for a fictional product.
They decide on the product, research similar products before coming up with a name and marketing concept for the product. They then write a script for the advert, gather together (or record) any necessary elements and sound effects before finally producing their advert. The adverts are then played to the class for review.

This project covers a number of key areas including:

• Reading Skills - Research product in print and web.
• Imagination - Both product and advertising concept produced by students.
• Writing Skills - Script needs to be produced and refined.
• Creative Skills - Record audio elements and potentially use audio editor to produce advert.
• Listening skills - Reviewing the adverts created by the class.

Historic Event News Coverage - Instead of writing about an event, why not record a radio news article as if reporting live from the events 'as they happen'.
Groups of students could research a historic event (like the Titanic sinking etc), think about what it would have been like to be there witnessing the events and how they may have been reported to the general public at the time. The students can then write a script for the news article, possibly including interviews with 'key' people involved. Completed articles can then be reviewed by the class.

This lesson would achieve many of the same goals as the previous one.

Record A Radio Play - Whilst radio is often seen as music based medium, it also has a rich heritage of drama with many landmark broadcasts that are now considered classics.
Performing a radio play is a lot easier than putting on a real play as no scenery is needed and students can read from books instead of learning lines, but it is also much more interesting than simply reading a play. Students can also consider sound effects and how to create the atmosphere of the play in an 'audio only' environment.

For older children, it is worth considering playing Orson Welles classic RKO production of War Of The Worlds (get it here from Amazon) as an example of how powerful a well produced radio feature can be. When it was first aired, frightened Americans took to the streets with guns, believing the invasion was real. This is because the first 20 minutes takes the form of a 'live news' broadcast (see previous Lesson Idea).

The BBC have some useful tips on writing your own radio play available on their website. Click here for the link.

The ideas above are just some of the innovative ways in which our radio packages have been used in real schools. Radio is a versatile medium that can be used in almost all areas of education at all levels.