Inspiration

Initial idea

The initial idea that I came up with came from my experiance of driving to school in the car. I remember my Dad putting radio 4 on and me not wanting to listen to it. This is where the original idea came from as I thought it would have been nice as a child to have something similar to what we are going to produce. I think that as a child I would really have enjoyed listening to the radio if it had been something specifcally aimed at children. I really love listen to radio now and I think that as a child I would have enjoyed it just as much as I do now if it had been something speifically aimed at my age group.

Content inspiration

These are the programmes that have inspired me when and helped me when I for the content that I have written.

In the night Garden

In the night garden is a show about creatures that Live in a garden that comes out when you go to sleep. I dont think much of the stories but the children always really seem to love the characters. I think that the way this show is done devlops the charecters and gives each one a unique spin.

They develop the charecter and they use the charecters to tell stories, It is very important that the children have familiarity in there programmes as a parent is more likely to let a child watch something if it is fimiliar and safe to them and to there children. Keeping the same charecters running throughout the programme is important and gives the children the fimilarity they need. I also think that ‘In the night Garden‘ establishes there charecters well.  within the first few months of it being shown many people knew who the characteres were and they had already been estabilshed and made safe. They made a huge franchise out of this when they released dolls and toys all to do with ‘In the night garden.’ The parents then baught these for the children because they had already been established as safe.

We could use this in our show. By having our three main characters and makeing the setting somewhere that children that age are fimilar with we can make the children feel safe and the parents feel safe letting there children listen to it. I dont think that there stories are very adaptable to radio as they require alot of visual stimulisation but I do think that  we can use there inspiration of how they establish there characters.

Cbeebies Podcast

This for me was the biggest inspiration. Not only did it help me with working out how to podcast things and what format would suit our show best. The Cbeebies podcast also helped me when I was writing the stories and the games.

The Cbeebies podcast is highlights of the Cbeebies stuff that has gone out that week on BBC radio 7. It is useually 2 or 3 stories that have already been broadcast once.  Having listen to at least 3 of the podcast, the way that they had done it cam across to me.

The podcasts are useually about 10mins long and they useually have a presenter that tells at least one of the stories. It is only highlights so it is very short. To keep the children interested they keep the segments short and they have lots of interesting sound effects. The presenters also put on voices so that the children can imagine the characters in there heads. This brings alot to all the stories that are played on the Cbeebies podcast. I think that this provides a good source of varitiy in stories.

I think this will help us in developing our show. It will help us when we right the stories and also when we are looking at how to read the stories. It also shows us what kind of things are good subjects for stories like telling the truth and stories about different types of people. I think tath varity is key in a kids shows and the Cbeebies podcast has varity in abundance.  I think we can take this from these podcasts.

To find out more about Cbeebies podcast look here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/cbeebies/ (website visited: 17:56 12/05/09)

Charlie and Lola

Charlie and Lola is a really good example of well written stories. The programme is full of stories. This is where I got some of the idea for the stories from.

The episode that was all about Charlie helping Lola get ready to go to school. But Lola keeps getting distracted. Again Charlie and Lola really develop there charecters well. Charlie and Lola are brother and sister. I think that this helps the children relate to them because every child knows someone with a brother or sister or has one themselves. It gives the child a sense that they are not alone in the world and that there brother or sister will always be there to help them. This makes the children feel safe and comforted. I think making sure that the children don’t feel alone is essential.

I think we could use this is our show, Making sure we have two people playing children instead of one always make sure that the children don’t feel left alone and it means they always have someone else to talk to. I think this work really well with the product that we are trying to do.

I also think that the stories that are on Charlie and Lola are also very good for our show. They inspire children to use there imagination. The episode I watched had Lola imaging a dragon all the way to school. It encouraged the children to do the same. We have used this idea in the imagination game and encouraged the children to use there imagination. I think looking at charlie and lola has really helped me when  I came to develop this story although most of it got cut I really think alot of it was inspired by Charlie and Lola.