Year 3 - Exploring The Media

Last Thursday, Year 3 students attended a the Exploring The Media incursion that included television, animation and radio activities. Students explored, created and viewed the different types of media, linked to our Inquiry Big Idea ‘I am Creative’. 

Following the incursion, students will be creating their own short films to share with their peers and community. 

Animation 

Prior to the incursion, students created their own background and cut out figures and objects to use in an 8 second stop motion animation. 

Themes included scoring a goal in a sports event, animals and humans interacting in hilarious ways and even stories that occurred in space. 

The students then created a title card on the day to introduce their film, with a title and their author names. Afterwards they used a special camera to capture their film, taking a photo, then moving their cut outs 1 millimetre before taking another photo. 

This process was repeated around 40-50 times to create the 8 second films. Students learnt about how animation works and the best techniques to ensure their films were smooth without abrupt changes in the character’s movements. These lessons will support our students in their future film making. 

TV 

We used a green screen to create a History of Television production. We had to rehearse a script and be actors. We got to do actions and talk. We read our scripts that hid behind the cameras to make our tv show better just like they do on the news. 

Ryan from Media Roadshow had awesome equipment and helped direct us on the stage. It was great to act as different characters. 

We had a host introduce the show and cool segments like 'Name that Show’, silly dancing, news and weather. The skills we got from doing this incursion were confidence, patience and respect.

Radio

Students took part in creating and performing a fun, documentary-style radio show that traced the fascinating evolution of radio—from live radio plays to music shows, talkback segments, and interviews. Each child had a role, either reading or singing their script, which helped bring history to life through sound. 

During the day, the Year 3 teachers guided their class in using simple radio equipment set up in a horseshoe arrangement, with microphones for students to speak into. 

The first 30 minutes were used for assigning parts and writing, followed by time to record the show. 

After the radio show, the class enjoyed the optional “Talkback Fun” activities, which required no preparation and were led by the teacher using the ready-made exercises. The kids loved this hands-on experience that combined learning about radio’s rich history with teamwork and confidence-building!