Wait… You can use video clips as TEXTS?!

As teachers, we are always looking for the best way to engage and connect with our students. When it comes to engagement, there’s nothing more intriguing than using a video or movie to help understand a concept more fully. As an elder millennial, I remember school movie days well. Our excitement would build as we saw our teacher wheel the tv cart into the room. Usually, our videos would have to do with a science concept (thanks Magic School Bus and Bill Nye the Science Guy), but as I got into high school, my English teachers would use videos and movies to explain an abstract writing concept, in a fun and engaging way (yes, I learned the hero archetype from Star Wars: Episode 3 and about medieval beliefs and cultures through Monty Python’s the Holy Grail. What can I say? I had pretty awesome English teachers!) This would help us to better understand and apply these concepts when we read more difficult texts, such as Beowulf and the Canterbury Tales. It also helped us apply these concepts to pop culture and draw similarities between the original text and the “new” spin on it (I’m looking at you, Harry Potter).

When having students create their own videos to relay their ideas, Turner and Hicks says to evaluate two areas: procedural knowledge of form and procedural knowledge of substance. Procedural knowledge of form attends to the “how” and “what” of video creation and procedural knowledge of substance handles the “why”. Knowledge of form addresses the physical creation and overall aesthetics of the video. From the camera angles to transitions within the video, knowledge of form covers a lot of the “physical” creation of the video. In addition, the knowledge of substance is the “why” or the message the creator is trying to relay to the viewer. (Turner and Hicks, 

In the world of Tik Tok and social media, many of our students are well versed in these areas and have been honing their skills for quite some time. According to “Incorporating Social Media into the Classroom: A Case Study on How TikTok can be Immersed into Classroom Pedagogy”, Sara Solomon promotes the idea that TikTok is not only an engaging social media platform, but it can also be used as a teaching “tool to support academic and social emotional wellbeing.” (Solomon, 2021) Since the COVID pandemic, TikTok has created a community of learners and creators that utilize 21st century skills to create content.(Solomon, 2021) This creates a community atmosphere on a worldwide scale. 

As I thought about how to go about restructuring my introduction video to be more informative and engaging, I couldn’t help but think of this project as a "mini PD". I believe that a video is a great way to get information across in a visually appealing way.



Solomon, Sara, "Incorporating Social Media into the Classroom: A Case Study on How TikTok can be Immersed into Classroom Pedagogy" (2021). Master of Science in Education | Master's Theses. 39.

https://doi.org/10.33015/dominican.edu/2021.EDU.02

Comments

  1. Mrs. Corbitt's ClassNovember 7, 2022 at 6:22 PM

    Great job, Jennifer! I can feel your excitement when the tv carts were wheeled into the classroom, because that is exactly what I felt. Our students today know nothing of this excitement. All that they know is video after video and digital everything. I also love the idea of creating videos as texts and creating videos for assignments such as my latest assignment, the argumentative essay. In fact, I had my students write about selfies and are they harmful or helpful while locating articles. Next year, I plan for my students to write their essays but then to use the medium of video to state their side using the evidence they found. Turner and Hicks say, "Our aim is to help students focus on the argument they are making. It is not that they are making a video; they are using the medium of video to make an argument, just as they could make an argument with alphabetic text on screen or paper" (Turner and Hicks, 2017, p. 84).

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    Replies
    1. Mrs. Corbitt's ClassNovember 7, 2022 at 6:23 PM

      Turner, K. H. & Hicks, T. (2017). Teaching adolescents to read and write digital text:

      Argument in the real world. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

      Delete
  2. AnonymousNovember 9, 2022 at 8:13 AM

    Hi Jennifer - Great job! It's so funny that you that you had an ELA teacher who taught about the Hero's Journey using Star Wars - I did too! They must have gone to the same PD :) Learning how to analyze films the same way I had been analyzing books in the ninth grade was revolutionary for me. It also changed the way I viewed video from there on out - whether it was in the classroom or not. My brother in law edits and creates movie trailers as his job out in Los Angeles, so we often talk about the importance of all the elements that go into a trailer that would entice a viewer to want to watch it. In that way, editing movie trailers IS a form of digital argument, much like Turner and Hicks (2017) write. I've seen teachers in the past have students create "Book Trailers" where students try to persuade people to read their book. I would like to begin incorporating both reading AND writing digital texts in this way. Another article that I found talked about how videos can help writers learn autonomy. Since we live in a time when so many skills can be taught via YouTube, I think it is worthwhile for us to show students HOW to utilize those.

    Trang, N. M. (2022). Using youtube videos to enhance learner autonomy in writing: A qualitative research design. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 12(1), 36. https://doi-org.ezproxy.montevallo.edu/10.17507/tpls.1201.05

    Turner, K.H., & Hicks, T. (2017). Teaching adolescents to read and write digital texts: Argument in the real world. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

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