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documentary blue
By audhill | August 3, 2007
I would like to have my students write, film and edit video documentaries this year. Last year, I didn’t get it done, in part because NCLB is such a prominent feature in our district that the time gets too chopped up. But, mostly, I didn’t do it out of rational fear…. not the kind of fear you’re supposed to just surmount, but reasonable fear based on some very important deficits. I have no training and I have no materials.
This summer I’ve been learning a bit about Adobe CS2 (and CS3 which won’t run on my single processor pc). My husband and I are editing video for a math lab project. I’ve learned a lot about Premiere and Encore (including the fact that I’m not set up for it and I have to buy a new computer to do this work) But, we don’t have Adobe at school. We have Windows Movie Maker available in the computer lab on all stations. I’ll have to use that. And, we only have one DV camera with no lights. I have to learn as I go. I meant to take a video filmmaking course this summer, but it was $1400 and I couldn’t do it. I have to DIY it.
I don’t like to go by the seat of my pants, although I have in the past and by the third or fourth year, it’s pretty good. Right now, I’m thinking that I can create a division of labor that will allow me to make one documentary per class (for a total of four) The easiest would be to focus it around an interview. I thought perhaps we could interview members of the school community, sort of a documentary about the lives of regular people in our school world. I work with middle school students, so it make sense to have filming right in the building as much as possible. Maybe start with one of the coaches. Film the interview, film him coaching, film a game, film him in class, stills of his family etc. Might be a good first video. I like the idea of a documentary team that documents school life and personnel. Maybe film a cafeteria worker, guard (one of our guards is farm team for the Knicks or something, another is a fireman) I think we’ve got a lot of interesting people right in the building. Multiple shorts about people in the building.
Anyway… it’s 3:23 in the morning and I’m surfing the net looking for curriculum materials… and I found nearly everything I need including links to great tools that I can use to support instruction on Adobe’s site. I found out about all of this over at Kim Cavanaugh’s Brain Frieze.
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