Kids These Days: Real teens and real talk in 2020
The Premise (from Apple Podcasts):
Kids These Days is a podcast hosted by teens, about teens. To get an unfiltered look into teenage life and to find out what we're thinking about, laughing about, and stressing about, subscribe to Kids These Days, a new show from Community High School in Ann Arbor and Michigan Radio's Peabody Award-winning podcast team.
Series or standalone:
Standalone
Begin listening to:
Any episode
Format:
Audio diary/interview
Host(s):
Teens from Ann Arbor's Community High School
Sound/production quality:
Very good
Rating/age suitability:
For teens and adults
Approximate length of episodes:
15-20 minutes
Curricular ties:
It's full of them! These are great model pods for any students who are creating their own podcast for school or for fun. Additionally, these would work in an advisory setting because they're good conversation starters about issues that affect all teens.
Similar recommended pods:
Podcast Librarian’s Review:
As some of you already know, I’m a middle school librarian by day (and pod-y animal by night. Ok, I’ll stop with the bad jokes). I recently taught Podcasting 101 to some of my students, and not at all to my surprise, tweens/teens are made for podcasting. I’ve listened to several pods that have teens as their hosts and producers, but it’s been a while since one made me want to listen to every new release. Enter: Kids These Days. First of all, the title is perfect. It’s a phrase often accompanied by an eye roll, but these teen podcasters have depth, insight, and plenty of personality, making the episodes fun and interesting listens. The topics are very “now”, from anxiety over COVID, to being surveilled by their parents via smart phones apps, to coming out, and more. The very first episode was about race, specifically as it relates to the death of George Floyd; clearly, this show is not afraid to tackle the big issues. The teens speak candidly, and many different voices are included. Though it wasn’t planned this way, I think it’s fortuitous that this pod was created during the pandemic because it serves as an effective time capsule of being a teen (already a difficult task) in an extraordinarily difficult time. If you’re a teen or someone who wants to understand teens better, this pod is worth the download, especially because each episode is only around 20 minutes. KTD hadn’t been released when I was teaching my middle school podcasters, but I will definitely be using it as a sample pod the next time I do teach. I hope its limited run will continue!
