Nearly 80 years before schools were forced to close due to COVID, Australian parents looked to the ABC to help educate, socialise and entertain their children when they had to keep their little ones at home.
When kindergartens were forced to close in Western Australia due to concerns about potential air raids during World War II, the Kindergarten Union of WA turned to ABC radio for help.
The result was a program called Kindergarten of the Air, and it would become a national favourite and game-changer in children's broadcasting globally.
"So many Australians and ABC listeners remember the theme song Boys and Girls Come Out to Play," said Professor Bridget Griffen-Foley, the founding director of the Centre for Media History at Macquarie University.
Wendy Bart is one of the listeners in WA who remembers the program fondly and who shared her memories with Your ABC Story.
"As a small child, the youngest of five children, I was devastated when all my older siblings left for school each weekday morning and I was home alone with my mother," she wrote.
"My mother was busy with housework, and so on would go the radio for Kindergarten of the Air.
"The radio was in the kitchen and I would gallop around the table when the teacher played her piano to gallop — I would march, skip, walk, creep. I learnt to sing songs and was riveted to the story told to me.
"I loved Kindergarten of the Air, and later when I was at school as well, if I was home sick, on would go the radio for Kindergarten of the Air."
Kindergarten of the Air was so popular in WA that the program continued to be broadcast after schools were allowed to reopen and a national version of it was introduced in 1943.
"I think one of the things that the presenters of this program were very good at doing was connecting with the imaginations of children," Professor Griffen-Foley said.
"And working with them to not just visualise things, but to sort of feel things and experience things.
"[The presenters] were trained kindergarten teachers. Some of them had real musical talent as well."
Radio version of a real kindergarten class
The national program had two hosts who alternated throughout the week. The first presenters were Ruth Fenner in Sydney and Anne Dreyer in Melbourne.
WA was able to keep its own original program with Margaret Graham as the host.
In an interview in 1984, Dreyer said she approached the radio program as though she was teaching a kindergarten class in person, directing her speech directly at the children she couldn't see.
"I think possibly, the great success that I had with that program was that I felt I was able to get the children who were listening involved.
Dreyer was the Victorian teacher for Kindergarten of the Air for 10 years, travelling to visit children and their families in various part of Australia.
"I think the greatest thing perhaps was in the country areas ... particularly, it helped children with loneliness," she said in 1984.
"Many people that I've met, since those days, have all spoken of how, as little children living away out on farms or in places that were inaccessible, almost, this program meant so much to them, because they felt that they were one of a group of people, a group of children during that period of time."
Australia led the world in kids programming
Professor Griffen-Foley said the program was very well received by children and their parents, with ABC offices across the country receiving letters, drawings and gifts from listeners for their "teachers".
Many infant schools and kindergartens would turn the radio on in their classrooms for the kids to play along.
"They're getting good-quality educational programming created by experts at the ABC, broadcast into kindergarten classes around Australia," she said.
It didn't take long for word of the success of Kindergarten of the Air to spread to other broadcasters overseas.
"The BBC observes with interest what the ABC is doing with the program," Professor Griffen-Foley said.
"Broadcasters in a range of different parts of the world, so Britain, the United States, Canada, Alaska, Fiji, start asking for scripts or samples of the program."
Kindergarten of the Air is also notable for the number of women who worked on it; not just as the on-air teachers but also producers behind the scenes.
"Some of the women who were involved … were really smart broadcasters and program developers and they did create quite new and innovative programs in Australia, and some of them had quite significant international … broadcasting connections," Professor Griffen-Foley said.
The last Kindergarten of the Air program was broadcast in 1985.
While little boys and girls are no longer sung to come and play each morning across ABC Radio, the memories are still strong and the ABC continues to provide programs made specially for kids across a range of platforms.
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