Digital Video

Personally I think digital video is a must for all primary classrooms. There is so much both the teacher and the students can do with it. Recently I took a maths lesson on data collection. As the students were also doing a unit on 'impacts on our native wildlife' I thought the maths lesson was a good opportunity to integrate the unit. I decided our data collection would be a hands on collection of rubbish around our school which we could then graph and analyse. However I needed a good hook to engage the students and make the connection between rubbish as a threat to our wildlife and collecting rubbish for a maths 'data interpretation' lesson. After hours of searching for the 'right' thing, I finally decided the best option was to create my own hook. A quick MovieMaker with powerful images and emotive music brought some of the students to tears (this was not my intention!). The students couldn't wait to get outside and begin collecting rubbish and not only did we classify the rubbish, graph it and interpret the information but the students were able to hypothesise, predict and discusss information pertaining to the graph. This also led to further discussion about the types of rubbish we found and how each category had a different potential for harming our wildlife. All this information and knowledge from a year 4 class developed from one simple 2 minute MovieMaker.

Just as pointed out by Kearney & Shuck (2006) my own short MovieMaker allowed the students to observe, enhanced and encourgaged communication, provided opportunity for the students to analyse and promoted critical reflection. I can only imagine the enormous benefits gained from the students producing a digital video themselves. What a great way to promote ownership of their learning and encourage creativity. I really feel with digital video the opportunities are endless. I look forward to hearing your comments and applications of this wonderful tool.