The working life of Museum of London

Alice, right and Richelle, left recording their podcasts in the Roman gallery

One of the important parts of Museum of London’s Stories of the World project is our new youth panel, called Junction, which you can read more about here. Junction panellists have the opportunity to take part in a number of training sessions, such as events planning and media for example. The skills gained in these workshops mean panellists can go on to run future events more confidently and gain some great skills for their CVs.

Alice, a Junction panellist, blogs about the podcast training she recently enjoyed…

“In the midst of most of the panel members exam season 3 of us were lucky enough to take time off and attend a podcasting and audio workshop. Under the supervision of Eric from SoundDelivery; myself, Richelle and Nicola along with Lucie (Museum of London Inclusion Officer) spent two days learning the basics of podcasting and each recorded and edited our own podcast.

Nicola, Alice and Richelle editing their podcasts

On the first day we learnt all the theory – such as “what is a podcast?”. Although most of us are familiar with the concept I don’t think any of us knew any of the specifics. When asked if we knew what an RSS feed was we were flummoxed! We all discovered how clueless we actually were but luckily Eric was really helpful and got onto the subject of what made good and bad podcasts. By learning from the mistakes of other podcasters we were able to discuss what we wanted our podcast to actually be. We discounted any fake dramas – as they just didn’t work and all fell a little bit in love with some children talking about a painting in the Tate Modern.

That afternoon we were let loose in the Roman gallery. We each had to choose something that really interested us in there and would each record our podcast about that object. I chose a vessel which still contained a cosmetic paste in it, Richelle chose a comb, Nicola a mortarium and Lucie chose a set of objects relating to Boudicca’s revolt. The discussion in the afternoon led us all to decide how we would relate our object to the present day and how we would plan our podcast. By the end of the day we had plans (for some of us these were pretty vague).

The second day was divided in two parts. The morning was our time to record and then in the afternoon we had to edit our audio. Recording in the galleries was not without its problems. The public in the galleries ensured that the sound levels were changing constantly and we had to keep remembering to record a “wild track”; this is 30 seconds of audio to use in editing to blend tracks. We also had to remember to press record in the first place. A mistake a few of us made – NOT RECORDING! Oops! Then in the afternoon we edited our audio. The room fell deathly silent as we determinedly edited our audio, getting rid of all the “ums” and “ahs” and beginning to hate the sound of our own voices. Editing was tough work but weirdly therapeutic. Once that was all done(ish) we listened to everyone’s finished project. It was really interesting how different people had made them and they were all really unique.

Alice editing her podcast

This training was really fun and rewarding and I had a great time doing it. It was a lot more complicated than I anticipated and I think we all appreciated Eric’s work. Now of course we must all put our teaching hats on and get ready to share our skills with the other Junction members. I think I’ve got a taste for podcasting and it’s a skill I really want to continue using so you’ll be hearing from me again soon.”

If you are aged 16 – 21 and are interested in joining Junction please contact us on junction@museumoflondon.org.uk