Videos by Students
On video filmmaking
Digital cameras and the editing power of I-movie have revolutionized use of video film. How best to integrate these tools into language learning? In literature and cultural studies classes, can filmmaking and editing be utilized as means to analysis and as a mode for thinking? In all my classes last semester, students took part in 4 hours of evening workshops to prepare them for their video assignments. The student response to these video assignments was overwhelmingly positive. Furthermore, the quality and variety of films was astonishly high and diverse, whether of action-film or thought-provoking nature. In every class, the use of video enhanced the enthusiasm of students for their other, more traditional assignments and their classroom participation. In terms of video and thought, I am convinced that editing a video is the equivalent of other kinds of analysis of a text: i.e., that it requires a depth of thinking and a process of making intellectual, critical, and aesthetic decisions. Students in German at Wheaton will end up not only language, but video and video-editing literate upon graduation.
A word on the use of video in language classes. There, my intention was to create activities outside the classroom that focus on oral proficiency in the targeted language. Video provides a framework within which students can practice and perform their language skills in a creative and fun-affirming atmosphere. The importance of partner work and collaboration is accentuated in such projects. As contradictory as it might sound, students lose their inhibiting self-consciousness in speaking a foreign language in front of a camera.