This summer at Apple Summer Institute (Canadian Edition) we where hanging out in Saint Andrews with dozens of people taking videos and pictures. Another awesome ADE suggested that we media geeks could use this footage and pics for our classes, and recently I put it into practice.
Students are now using footage taken by more than one ADE in Saint Andrews to make a 30 second TV commercial for this gorgeous town. We've finished this project and are on to the next one, but here's how to do it:
1. Get students to 'research' promotional videos for other towns and cities on Youtube. I love that I can call checking Youtube research with the multimedia classes.
2. Students then blog about what makes up a quality promo video.
3. Use student responses on the blog to have a focused discussion about criteria and assessment. The beginnings of a rubric comes out of this activity.
4. Students learn about Final Cut Express with daily 10 minute lessons about how to edit.
5. Take the student developed criteria and link it to the curriculum outcomes for the CTS COM courses I am using for this unit. Create a rubric (easier said than done, I know!)
6. Get feedback from students about what went well and what didn't. It's always good to get feedback when you try something new!
Here are the student generation criteria after I massaged the wording a bit for their promotional video. Next time I will be adding guiding questions to help them to be thinking about what each criteria will look like in their finished product.
1. Clip selection
2. Narration
3. Music selection, genre
4. Transitions-effective use
5. Editing/timing of clips
6. Slogan for St. Andrews
7. Titles (Livetype)
This assignment really separates those who want to learn how to edit and those who are just along for the ride. I'm ready for them to start their group assignments and I'm excited for our Iron Chef projects coming up. Stay tuned!
