Se7en Podcasts That We Are Listening to Right Now…

Each week we post a collection of Books We Have Been Reading Lately on our blog, but I thought you might something a little different this week. One of the most frequently asked questions that we get is: What podcasts do we listen to and where do we find them? We listen to tons of podcasts and the more you listen to the more you will find. They are free, they are fun and they are a great way to add “audible content” to your days.

We are members of audible books and we eagerly await our audible credits on the first of the month… but when our audible books are finished then we rely on podcasts to get our audible time in. Otherwise we use podcasts during school time, we use podcasts to listen to stories, we use podcasts in the car. Our podcast diet is very varied and from week to week it can change, as we discover new podcasts and make tweaks here and there to what is relevant for us.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with podcasts, hi mom (!), they are really just modern day radio, you down load the episodes and listen whenever you want to. You can head to the link that I have highlighted in the title of each podcast… listening on the website, or you can listen in itunes. We use an app called downcast to listen to our podcasts… it is free and within that we can subscribe to any number of podcasts. The thing I like about Downcast is that each episode downloads with it’s show notes… and that makes it easy to follow links and resources associated with a particular podcast.

Se7en Podcasts That We Use For School

1. 5 minutes in Church History with Stephen Nichols: Short… literally five minutes, and an interesting snippet from Church history.
2. Tumble Science Podcast for Kids: Interviews with real scientists about their work, and covering a wide array of interesting topics. Many topics that you might have thought difficult and they make them easy to understand and more than that, they make science sound totally cool and fun. Each podcast is about fifteen minutes long and your kids will ask for “just one more.”
3. The Earth Rangers Podcast: If you live with any young animal lovers then they will love this podcast… they are only a few episodes, but we have subscribed in the hopes that there will be many more. They are totally worth listening to. Emma, the Earth Ranger, tells us all about special animals and interviews actual scientists that work with them. Amazing and wonderful facts for animals from all over the world.

4. Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls: Not a lot of episodes yet, but they are slowly loading… we listen immediately and then wait impatiently for the next one. There is more information/story in the podcasts than in the books and we have really enjoyed them… all my kids love these and are inspired by them.
5. Young Ben Franklin: we are loving this one right now, for young American History buffs, this is the story of a young Benjamin Franklin, as he leads his friends in and out of Colonial Boston, in a wild treasure hunt, solving mini-mysteries, figuring out puzzles and creating inventions all the way. This is a great show packed with history learning. The longest episode is about twenty minutes, but most are about fifteen… which means a quick listen when you need fifteen minutes of down time.
6. WOW in the World: This is touted as the podcast for curious kids and their grownups, and it is filled with amazing facts and understandable scientific stuff. Our latest listen was on how to Sleep Your Way to Victory… yes, I am the mother that played that particular podcast about five times (I am not kidding) for everyone to listen too.
7. The Mayan Crystal: This is the story of Aurelia and her sister, two girls living in a Mayan village… and their village, their customs and their culture are under the threat of deforestation. There is a race against time as the two sisters try to save their village from the destructive contractors and they find themselves in the spiritual world of the ancient mayans and a far bigger challenge in front of them than a couple of building contractors. Nine episodes have the girls racing through the jungles of Belize, with the help of a number of spirit animals. Mayan mythology and and ancient legends wind their way through the story.

Podcasts That I Enjoy In and Out of My Day

1. The Read Aloud Revival: Love, love, love the Read A Loud Revival. I have podcasts that I dip into, selecting which episodes I want to listen to and those that I can pass on… but the read aloud revival I listen to every single episode and lots of them I listen to multiple times. This is not just a podcast for homeschooling parents… it is for all parents, who want to gift their children with a love of books. Inspiration, author interviews… the what, where, why and how of family reading. LOVE IT!!!
2. A Brave Writer’s Life in Brief: Julie Bogart is a veteran homeschool mom, who is passionate about teaching kids to write, she has a website full of great resources and on her podcast she interviews folk who are equally passionate about kids and writing… it is great inspiration and I always come away from her podcasts inspired and encouraged.

3. Happier with Gretchen Rubin: I absolutely loved her books… “Happier at Home” has to be one of my all time favourite books. And I dip into her podcasts, she always inspires me to live life better… try new things, figure out how to get all those habits rolling as they ought to be… in her podcasts she chats with her sister about what’s working, what isn’t and why.
4. The Story: This is a collection of biographies about famous and heroic people… and you listen away, but they only tell you who the actual person is right at the end of the podcast… so it is a bit of a listening mystery and a built in guessing game. Some of my kids like and others find it a little grownup, so that’s why I put it in the “for parents: category.
5. The Beautiful Writers Podcast: About 40 minutes of great conversations with your favourite authors, from all over the internet. Just great to pop on
6. The Bible Project: We use the Bible Project a lot in our homeschool, we use the videos on Youtube… every time we start reading a new book of the Bible, and print out the posters for each book for our family school journals. But I really enjoy their podcasts too, they have a couple of series that are really good. Right now I am listening through the How to Read the Bible Series, it is fantastic.

7. Modern Mrs Darcy, and What Should I Read Next? Well… this is book heaven. Anne Bogel interviews book lovers from all walks of life, asks them what books they have read and enjoyed and then she recommends a bunch more… the things is a podcast all about books. What could be better? Not to mention her brand new book launched today… check it out.

There are many more podcasts that we listen to regularly, but this is a start, to inspire you to get listening already.