RTÉ, through the Documentary On One has partnered with Junior Cycle for Teachers (JCT) to bring radio into the classrooms in second level schools around the country.

Eleven Documentary On One productions have been carefully selected for Junior Cycle students. You can view the list here.

Each radio documentary is accompanied by a worksheet (JCT Inspectorate approved) to enable both students and teachers to analyse, discuss and utilise these radio documentaries to engage with the Learning Outcomes in the English Specification.

By critically listening to these award winning audio texts, students will develop their listening skills, oral proficiency and writing skills.

Using a thematic approach, and based oral and writing assignments on the learning outcomes from the English specification, experienced teachers have formulated the accompanying worksheets for each documentary.

Each worksheet uses the documentary as a non literary text, as is specified in the Guidelines for first and second year classes. Students will listen to a selection of the chosen documentaries as part of their study of non-literary texts, and will develop their proficiency in listening, speaking, reading and writing.

These worksheets are available to download under the heading, Educational Resources on the 'Documentary On One' website. Individual clips from each documentary are also available.

"One of the most radical differences in the new Junior Cycle specification is the "strong focus on the oral dimension of language... This makes the English classroom an active space, a place of ‘classroom talk’ where learners explore language and ideas as much through thinking and talking as through listening and writing."

Specification for Junior Cycle English, October 2015 (Page 12)

  • In studying the documentary, students engage with all four LITERACY skills, i.e. Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing.
  • The oral and written assignments support development of JUNIOR CYCLE KEY SKILLS as well as a selection of LEARNING OUTCOMES from the ENGLISH SPECIFICATION.
  • By the end of each unit of work, students will be ready to complete a summative assessment task, suitable for the Oral Communication Task.
  • In a carefully staged, AFL process, each thematic unit is organised as follows:
    • Pre-listening resources which challenge students to think around the central theme of the unit, tapping into their prior knowledge, their thoughts and feelings about the context in the text
    • Active listening resources to promote careful listening
    • Post-listening resources which are linked directly to the documentary content
    • The unit ultimately builds up to a summative task. This section of the unit includes resources which focus on measuring the learning achieved by students in the unit. The outcomes can be used for the Oral Communication Task.
    • In addition there are further reflective/ creative resources which could be used to support learning, teaching and assessment in the unit. Methodologies used in the teaching and learning resources encourage the student to become a critical, autonomous, self-directed and reflective learner. This is facilitated through AFL tasks which include peer and self-reflection sheets.

Junior Cycle English has two Classroom-Based Assessments (CBA) with an associated Assessment Task and a Final Assessment, one of which is the Oral Communication Task (an individual or group presentation or communication).

"In the Oral Communication Task "Students are given an opportunity to choose a topic or issue that is of interest or importance to them and to carry out an exploration over time. The development of basic research skills will be central here, e.g. searching for information, reading and notemaking, organising material, using key questions to give shape to ideas, developing a point of view, preparing a presentation… [with] useful opportunities for the study of a range of oral presentation styles… the task offers students opportunities, where appropriate, to collaborate with classmates…for summative assessment."

Specification for Junior Cycle English, October 2015 (Page 25/26)