Education Rethink: What-Works Wednesday: Documentary

I will be co-leading a documentary project with an ELL fifth grade classroom. ?One thing I'm realizing is that my process is a bit of a mystery to people. ?This post might be a no-brainer waste of time or it might be helpful. ?But I thought I would take some of the common questions I get about student documentaries and answer them all in one post.

Why should teachers consider having students create a documentary?

In my experience, documentaries are an engaging, creative way for the class to do authentic research, writing and speaking. ?It's a truly multimedia framework, but it doesn't require a one-to-one student to device ratio. ?However, it goes deeper than that. ?When students create a documentary, it becomes a chance to express their individual and collective voice and becoming creators rather than consumers of information.?

What criteria do you use for the topic?

I explain to the class that the topic must be specific enough that we can present it in ninety minutes, but broad enough that we can find enough relevant information. ?From there, the class negotiates the topic ideas and we eventually decide upon it through a democratic process.?

What if the topic doesn't fit the standards?

I approach it as a chance to teach language arts standards. ?Other skills include:?

• Questioning strategies: critical thinking, inference, clarifying questions
• Research: inquiry questions, primary and secondary sources, source construction, validity, data analysis using multiple methods (online text, newspaper articles, magazines, books, live interviews)?
• Oral fluency: accuracy, expression, pace when they recorded their scripts
• Reading skills: compare and contrast, cause and effect, etc.
• Analyzing persuasive text: bias, loaded language, propaganda?
• Analyzing expository text: facts, opinions, main ideas
• Analyzing narrative text: elements of literature, sequencing,?
• Analyzing functional text: following directions in trouble-shooting, analyzing environmental text connected to the topic
• Technology criticism: questions about editing (such as "How do people change on camera?" or "What are the dangers in collecting and constructing truth?"), visuals, amusement ("How does this medium shape the message?") and intellectual property (such as Creative Commons images)

But what if the topic seems shallow?

I had a group that wanted to do Coca-Cola. ?What began as a fairly dull "history of Coke," became an analysis on childhood obesity, cultural imperialism, mass media in globalization and several other subtopics. ?

What type of a framework do you do to keep it organized?

After developing a topic, students join groups based upon sub-topics. ?They conduct research and complete their "product" in an ongoing cycle of research-creation. ?Each group has to complete interviews, create a video and compose a picture-with-audio video (think annotated slideshow like Ken Burns). I ask the groups to monitor their own progress and then I check up on the progress throughout the process as well.?

Do you have an overall timeframe?

I tend to spend a full semester on it, blending parts both in-class and out-of-class. ?Here is the way I organize it:

• Phase One: Planning
• Students negotiate a topic
• Students research sources
• Students brainstorm people to interview
• Students practice using quality questioning strategies
• Small groups form and develop sub-topics
• Small groups develop essential questions
• Phase Two: Research and Creation Cycle - this phase can be really chaotic and messy, but it almost needs to be this way to let it work organically
• Students conduct research using multiple methods (the research chart works well for this)
• Students reflect on the process (tech criticism, summarizing, etc.) on individual blogs and on a class-wide blog
• The whole class engages in discussion, dialogue and debate regarding both the content and the methods of presenting
• Groups begin completing interviews, developing skits, creating smaller videos and writing / recording a script
• Phase Three: Editing
• Students edit smaller videos to post on the blog and then edit their small group portions (typically about ten minutes a piece)
• A small group of students stay after school to create a unified "look" for transitions, titles and music. ?

What do students typically include in the final product?

We stretch the boundaries of documentary, I suppose. ?Students do interviews, picture-with-audio, sketch comedy / satire, puppet shows, neighborhood videos, stop-animation and short videos. ?Some of the videos have shocked me in their creativity. ?These are pieced together into a larger narrative that the class organizes together.

Does it require extra work of the teacher?
Honestly, it does. ?It requires some good organizational / systems thinking, which can be difficult for me. ?However, after learning the ropes on the first few, it's getting easier.?

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Source: http://www.educationrethink.com/2011/09/what-works-wednesday-documentary.html

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