I admit. I loved acting in school. I took a Performing Arts class my senior year and just loved the spot light. So, when we created our own video in grad class last week and had to edit it using Movee Maker, I jumped at the opportunity to be silly and a little crazy, so I'm thinking my students, who are only 10 and 11 years old, would love to play with a video camera and edit their own.
Anywho, I introduced treatments today to my students. Amazing how they immediately wanted to jump into acting out their commercial. I explained that we had to identify the purpose, audience, style, and length first. THEN, PLAN! No one wanted to plan. They had an idea and wanted to run with it. Wait until I introduce storyboarding! Some of them might just fall over with the amount of detailing and planning that goes into that!
The one thing I struggle with is TIME. There is seriously never enough. And if students are creating from the very beginning with a blank slate, it seems to take even longer. For my unit, I'm not actually having students create their commercials. It's more for practice to get storyboarding down. And, when I begin my next unit in S.S., then they actually will create their commercial. They'll have treatment and storyboarding under their belt, and perhaps it won't take as long...I guess I'll just have to wait and see.
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Christine,
ReplyDeleteI love your blog! You do an excellent job of engaging your audience on topics that might not appeal to everyone, such as storyboarding. You must be a 5th grade teacher preparing for the Writing SOL tests :) Time is a huge struggle for me. Between SOL tests, over a week off due to snow, and an upcoming Spring Break I'm beginning to worry if I'll ever finish my two practicum lessons before graduation. Keep up the great work on your blog!
When it comes to podcasting and making videos you are like a different person Christine! You are too funny. It is great that you show so much excitement because the kids will see that and want to make videos and podcasts also!
ReplyDeleteWe enjoyed your acting in class as well. I agree with you that there is not enough time in the day with our students. I think it is a great idea to have your students really get the hang of writing the storyboard and identify the purpose, audience, style, and length first. When I first did storyboarding with my class last year, I felt like it took forever. I will definately plan for more time with this activity this year.
ReplyDeleteChristine it makes complete sense to me that you loved acting...given what you did in our survivor video I was starting to think you had missed your true calling :)
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean about getting kids to plan! I teach film and photography middle school electives and they want to create first, plan later. They always complain about storyboards and "DEAPR." However, the one or two students who do take time to plan always create amazing, artistic, and cohesive projects...loads better than those who didn't plan. I keep using these kids as examples and hoping it will catch on. I also told them it took a decade to make Avatar...which TONS of storyboards, which seemed to affect some of the boys...