Moviemaking in the Classroom

Lifting Student Voices Through Digital Storytelling

Jessica Pack

• Publisher: International Society for Technology in Education
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781564849267
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Theory & Practice

Written by an award-winning classroom teacher with years of experience integrating moviemaking into curriculum, this book offers quick-start lesson plans for any content area and grade level, helping students amplify their voices and effect change through moviemaking. Our world hinges on storytelling and the ways in which stories can be told are always evolving. For students to become future-ready, confident creators of original content, they need opportunities to share their stories. Moviemaking helps students showcase their learning, process their lives and connect with others in a meaningful way. Moviemaking in the Classroom breaks down the process of digital storytelling to help teachers plan efficient and effective instructional sequences. The book provides guidance on how to purposefully build visual and audio literacy skills to improve student work and increase student efficacy in the creative process. Also included are practical suggestions for removing barriers from the storytelling process, such as how to provide more opportunities for students to tell their stories during a single academic year.This book:

• Shows teachers how to create efficient and effective lesson sequences with digital storytelling in mind, particularly in a blended learning environment.
• Supports teachers who are new to digital storytelling by showing the impact and importance of providing students with multiple opportunities to tell their stories.
• Offers project ideas for teachers already implementing digital storytelling in their classes and shows how to streamline workflow and improve their professional practice.
• Supports distance and remote learning through a full chapter on strategies for applying these practices to a distance learning environment.
• Fosters diversity, inclusion and student empowerment by showcasing student examples on topics including racism, death and illness, immigration, gun violence and pollution.

This book provides insight, inspiration and practical ideas to empower teachers of all content areas to implement moviemaking projects with their students using best practices. Audience: 3-12 educators

Chapter 1

My Storytelling Journey

One of the best moments of my professional life involved standing on the beach at the Salton Sea, the smell of sulfur filling my nostrils and the crunch of fish scales under my feet. Once a resort for the Hollywood crowd during the glamorous Golden Age of film, the Salton Sea is a deep, man-made lake that rests 236 feet below sea level. It is known locally as a place where the salt content is so high that many marine species can’t survive. Thousands of dead fish litter the sandy shoreline and though their bodies decompose, their scales remain. Agricultural runoff has polluted the waters, causing a sulfuric smell that travels for miles during the summer months—I can sometimes smell it from my classroom door at the other end of the Coachella Valley. Still, standing there in triple-digit heat on a Saturday in September, I couldn’t have been happier as I listened to the director give his actors a pep talk.

“What we need to remember is that these characters are on a quest. They could literally save this kid’s entire future if they find the buried treasure.” The director, Jebari, sat on a picnic table and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees. He spoke earnestly as the actors listened carefully.

“This kid’s family is falling apart. He’s desperate and it’s our job to help viewers understand that. Maybe somebody who watches our movie will have parents going through a divorce, too. This story works because it’s relatable. We’ve spent a lot of time preparing. Now, let’s get out there and make it happen. Oh, and Isaiah? Spit out your gum, man.”

There was a flurry of sand as the crew scrambled to turn on iPads, sweep up boom mics, and grab extra copies of the script. The actors double-checked their costumes and the producer yelled for places. Someone found the clapper board. Jebari put on the headphones that were connected to the microphone. He took a deep breath.

“Quiet on the set, guys. And … action!”

Watching my middle school students carry out the complex enterprise of shooting off campus was a wonder to behold. Aside from occasionally troubleshooting technical issues or giving advice on how to adapt to the numerous lighting challenges created by the hot desert sun and the sparkling blue water, I wasn’t involved much. They ran the show. It was my job simply to supervise and enjoy the backdrop of the sea as it glittered in nearly every shot.

Months later, as my students walked on stage to accept an award for their movie, entitled Lost Ships, I was so proud that I cried. That spring, Jebari walked the red carpet at the Palm Springs International Film Festival because he earned a student director’s pass to attend panel discussions on filmmaking. All because of a little digital story that started out in my classroom and proved what I had always known: Storytelling opens doors.

As a teacher, my discovery of storytelling happened quite by accident. I certainly didn’t start out filming on location, or filming at all, actually. During my second year of teaching, my principal asked for volunteers to pilot our district’s first technology initiative: a 24/7 MacBook program. There were only two of us who were willing to take part in the pilot. In retrospect, as a new teacher, I was living in a perpetual state of flexibility, constantly being forced to think on my feet as I learned how to teach middle schoolers. It was probably this adaptability that allowed me to approach the 24/7 program without fear and to embrace instruction in a digital environment.

A few weeks into the pilot, I remember watching my students create digital plot diagrams when a hand tentatively raised into the air. The hand belonged to one of my favorite students—even though teachers are not supposed to have favorites. Kasen was a bright kid, with a mile-wide mischievous streak and the kind of sarcastic wit typical of middle school boys.

“Um, excuse me, Mrs. Pack …” he said. “I found something really cool. Actually, a lot cool. I accidentally clicked on something. Did you know we can make movies on our computers? No, seriously. There’s this star icon …”

Inadvertently, Kasen had discovered iMovie, and that was the moment my instructional paradigm shifted. Even now, fifteen years later, I can picture it clearly in my mind: The afternoon sun filtering through the skylight in my classroom, 35 students craning their necks to peer curiously over at Kasen’s desk. There was an undercurrent of excitement and whispered voices asking where to look for the star icon. We didn’t learn any more about plot diagrams that day. Instead, we went on one of the most important sidebars of my career, an exploration that would shape not only my professional practice, but my teaching philosophy, too. It would also function as the catalyst in my quest to understand what it means to be a storyteller, and ultimately discover my own voice as a teacher-filmmaker.

Educational Context

There is a high level of need in my community and many students, families, and teachers face educational challenges. My school district serves approximately 21,000 students, 29% of whom are English language learners. At my school, 84% of the families we serve live below the poverty line, and the vast majority of students are Hispanic and from Spanish-speaking homes. Only 39% of our high school graduates are categorized as “prepared for college” according to Policy Analysis for California Education (2018), and the reality is that most of our students will not attend a four-year university. In fact, many of our students rarely venture outside of the Coachella Valley even as adults, despite being only about 90 miles away from Los Angeles.

Being a part of a technology pilot program appealed to me because it meant putting other options on the table for my students. Letting them know that they had more choices at their disposal—if they worked hard to acquire digital age skills—could change the trajectory of their lives. Kasen’s discovery of iMovie made a brand-new pathway available: content creation. What could students create if given the opportunity? What effect could this have on their education? On their future? Ideas began to percolate, and I started to think this all-important question: What if?

Becoming Storytellers

The first movies my students ever made were tied directly to core content standards, and we made them shortly after Kasen’s discovery. Students were given a standard and asked to find a way to teach viewers about the concept being covered. One of my students, Isabel, created a wonderful movie about density and buoyancy. In one scene, she took a beach ball into her pool and demonstrated that it could float, unlike other objects which only dropped to the bottom. I remember watching her video after school with my team teacher, Julie. We were absolutely floored that it was possible for kids to be in their home environment, demonstrating academic understanding, and investing time and effort outside of the classroom in a way we had never seen before. The videos were not technical marvels. In fact, they were fairly low resolution because students used the iSight cameras on their laptops to film everything. The concept of better film equipment had not even entered our minds yet. However, this was our first inkling that making movies could be an expression of content mastery.

Next, my students created public service announcements about any problem they could identify in our community. Kasen’s project was about the danger of talking to strangers. He refused to write a script and decided to wing the process instead, casting his father as the stranger and his little brother as the hapless victim. Not knowing much about the production process yet, I let him blaze his own trail and simply hoped for the best. Kasen told me that he cradled his MacBook in his arms as he filmed his dad walking up the pathway to the front door. The footage ended up taking on a point-of-view quality, almost like something out of The Blair Witch Project. The entire plot consisted of the stranger knocking on the door, having a friendly chat with a child, and then asking to use the phone. Once the stranger was allowed inside, he grabbed the student. The door drifted closed, the screen faded to black, and bright red letters appeared: “Don’t Talk to Strangers. Or Else.”

I remember trying to convince Kasen that he should refilm to get rid of the shaky footage. I remember suggesting that perhaps he would like to add some music or a title slide. My intention was to convince him to make a slightly more polished product, but he held firm and insisted that his PSA was the perfect embodiment of his vision, shaky camera and all. As I look back on it now, I realize that Kasen was right. He held on to creative control instinctively, and I—as almost all teachers do at one time or another—thought I needed to assert my role as the instructor. However, no matter how much I wanted to polish it up to be closer to my view of perfection, I couldn’t ignore the insistent feeling that there was something truly special about Kasen’s project. Fortunately, the arrival of a visitor helped me understand just what was so extraordinary.

Piloting the 24/7 MacBook program meant that my classroom often received guests. Everyone in and out of the district seemed to want to see firsthand what it was like to teach in a digital environment. One of the technology leaders for my district, Dr. Lee Grafton, stopped by unexpectedly one day, bringing a community member in tow. She introduced the guest as David, who lived in Palm Springs and was interested in helping the district in some way. I assumed that meant he was a potential donor for program expansion, so I talked at length about the types of work my students were able to accomplish using computers. When I mentioned that we had recently discovered how to make movies, his eyes lit up. “Show me,” he said.

I played Isabel’s movie on buoyancy and raved enthusiastically about how it demonstrated her mastery in science. David was polite, but seemed slightly detached, maybe even disappointed somehow. I couldn’t read him very well, so I was surprised when he asked, “Do you have anything else?”

I can’t explain why I showed him Kasen’s PSA, but I did. Ten seconds into the movie, David’s expression grew intense. He edged in front of me, got down on his knees next to the desk, and proceeded to watch the video three more times. After the fourth viewing, he looked up at me from the Macbook on the desk and said, “Now, that’s a story.”

They left shortly thereafter, with none of the effusive comments I was used to hearing. I wasn’t sure what to make of the visit, until Dr. Grafton called me after school that day.

“Thank you for letting us visit. David was very impressed. He’s thinking and he wants to help, he’s just figuring out how.”

“That’s nice,” I responded. “I’m glad he liked seeing the kids’ work. Who is he, again? A local resident?”

She laughed. “His name is David Vogel. He just retired and moved to the desert full-time. He’s looking for a way to give back. Oh, and he’s the former president of Walt Disney’s Buena Vista Motion Pictures Group.”

As a result of David’s classroom visits that year, he founded a nonprofit called DIGICOM Learning, whose mission was to promote and support digital storytelling in Southern California classrooms. At the time, I was the only teacher he had met who was integrating moviemaking into core content areas. So, after about a year, David brought me on board to teach colleagues about how and why they should implement moviemaking in their classrooms. By then, I had plunged headfirst into the idea that making movies to assess student understanding was far more effective and engaging than any multiple-choice test I could write. I applied the writing process to scripting and taught my students how to draw storyboards. With a background in photography as a hobbyist, I had a good eye for shots, so I started systematically teaching kids about film angles. At this point, my learning focus was wrapped up in the technical aspects of moviemaking, but over time I grew to understand that it is the story that really matters.

I ended up working as a teacher-consultant for DIGICOM Learning for the next decade. Throughout my tenure at DIGICOM, I had the opportunity to work with hundreds of teachers across Southern California classrooms. My conversations with David and the other fil...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• About ISTE
• About the Author
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• Part 1 Why Story?
• Part 2 The Nuts and Bolts of Storytelling Through Moviemaking
• Part 3 Getting Started with Students
• Acknowledgments
• References
• Index
• Back Cover