Educational podcasts and children’s radio
Promenades imaginaires au musée d’Orsay, a podcast created by the Orsay Museum, telling stories based on famous paintings. Each episode is under fifteen minutes.
Salut l’info !, podcast created by French radio station France Info in partnership with children’s magazine Astrapi, providing news bulletins for children. Children can call in and tell their stories! Each episode is under twenty minutes.
Mythes et légendes, podcast exploring mythology from ancient Egypt to Norse gods, each episode is under fifteen minutes.
Les Odyssées, podcast brought to you by French radio station France Inter, delving into the lives of historic figures, from Alexandra David-Néel to King Tutankhamun. Each episode is under twenty minutes.
Petit Curieux, by culture podcast network Choses à Savoir, answers questions from children in under two minutes.
Bloom, a podcast created by La Radio des Enfants, an audio production company founded by French cinema veterans, curating radio shows to children. Each episode is under twenty minutes.
Les dents et dodo, a podcast created by news network BFMTV: three-minute educational episodes for children to learn while they brush their teeth.
Les ptits bateaux, podcast hosted by France Culture producer Noëlle Bréham, where children can phone in to ask a question, and passionate experts will answer a couple per episode ! Each episode is under thirty minutes.
La puce à l’oeille, a podcast bringing outside-the-box insights on science, the arts, history, math and more to kids, sponsored by the Quebec Culture Ministry. Wide variety of episode lenghts, but the longest are under forty minutes.
Radio Bambou, a podcast created by ecology news group Reporterre, explains environmental challenges for children, in under fifteen minutes.
Maman j’ai raté l’actu, a podcast bringing news to children and answering their questions, in under twenty minutes.
Et Voilà, a podcast interviewing children about a wide range of topics, giving a voice to French-speaking around the world. Each episode is under ten minutes.
WILD, a podcast about animals, with four in-depth episodes about dogs, lemurs, dolphins, and reindeers. Each episode is under half an hour.
Ecoute buissonière, created by French, Belgian, and Canadian radio stations, ran a youth radio contest, and the winners were broadcast on Belgian radio ACSR last fall. The shows, which vary widely, from short original stories to much longer, soundscape videos, are from three minutes to an hour long.
Music and musical stories
Radio Pomme d’Api, an all-day-long radio station curated by Pomme d’Api magazine, offering songs, nursery rhymes, stories, and poems by popular French-language artists.
Henry Dès, Swiss singer-songwriter very popular with children.
Tatatoum, an album of movement and miming songs by child movement specialist and performer Laurent Lahaye.
L’histoire de Babar, a classical piece by Francis Poulenc based on the French children’s comic Babar.
Le carnaval des animaux, Camille Saint-Saëns’s classic musical story, associating a different musical instrument to each character.