After working with children in school, share your
observations and reflections. What surprises you? What were the challenges and
how might you overcome these? What have you learnt?
Before attending the session I felt anxious due to
having limited knowledge of editing and working with the children within a
short time limit to create the advertisement. However, I was surprised how well
the filming process went. All the children were engaged in the task, which
could be due to working with new technology which has been seen to increase
engagement (Montgomery and Gottlieb-Robles, 2006). When speaking to the
children I was surprised of their knowledge of the process of filming and
editing. However, I do question if this is due to: filming being a familiar
process due to the schools resources or if it is that the generation are
‘digital natives’ (Palfrey and Gasser, 2008). I was also surprised how well the
children worked and the pace they worked at when filming, this surprised me due
to my original concern of not completing the filming in the time frame.
After reading literature I found it interesting to
see how my experiences with the children supported the literature. Willett
(2009) stated that it is important for children to be able to share their media
productions with a potential global audience. After introducing the task to the
children, the first question a child raised was if the advert would go on to the
internet to be shared, I found this interesting that a year three child
supported Willett’s theory. Wyse and Jones (2008) proposed that boys are
generally more interested in new technology than girls. This was apparent as
the boys tended to want to have the filming role more than the girls.
When filming with the children a question was
raised, how would a teacher support a whole class when creating media based projects?
From a discussion with the teacher he advised doing whole class projects where
each group of children have different roles until the children have enough
knowledge and skills to work within a small group with teacher support. A
challenge when working under a time limit was the editing process, a way of
overcoming this which was advised by a teacher was to make media projects cross
curricular to gain more time. Allen, Potter, Sharp and Turvey (2012) claim that
children should begin with simple editing software packages, using a basic
software package may resolve the time issue when editing with children.
Allen,
J., Potter, J., Sharp, J. and Turvey, K. (2012) primary ICT Knowledge, Understanding and Practice London: Sage
Learning Matters
Montgomery,
K. and Gottlieb-Robles, B. (2006) ‘Youth as e-Citizens: The Internet’s
Contribution to Civic Engagement’ in Buckingham, D. and Willett, R. (Eds) Digital Generations: Children, Young people,
and New Media New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc
Palfrey,
J. and Gasser, U. (2008) Born Digital:
Understanding The First Generation of Digital Natives New York: Basic Books
Willett,
R. (2009) ‘Young People’s Videos Productions as New Sites of Learning’ in
Carrington, V. and Robinson, M. (Eds) Digital
Literacies: Social Learning and Classroom Practices London: Sage
Wyse, D.
and Jones, R. (2008) Teaching English,
Language and Literacy (2nd Edition) Abingdon: Routledge
I found it interesting that you found that boys are more interested in techonology than girls, as this was also apparent in my group.
ReplyDeleteI agree that this activity would have to be cross curricular to gain more time as this was a concern for me, I felt if children were not a part of the editing process the opportunity for ICT learning was being missed and they were not gaining knowledge of the whole process of creating a film.
I still feel that enough support would be needed to gain successful outcomes particularly during the filming, in reality children would probably need to take it in turns to film as a group supported by the teacher or teaching assistant.