Jaclyn Hawkins
Field Experience Reflection: Biome Infomercials
Description
A science teacher at my school approached me to ask if I had any ideas of an engaging project for her 7th grade science students’ biome projects this year. She usually has them make brochures, but she was looking for something new to try. I suggested to her that she have her students make infomercials, basically selling their biome to the audience. I did some quick research and sent her an email with example infomercials to show the class and basic guidelines to what the project would need to include. When she said she was interested I then made a more thorough rubric for the students based on Windows Movie Maker with all the essential components included. We did encounter a problem with the computers at our school; they will not support Windows Movie Maker. Our tech person did not come out to download it until the students were already almost done with their research, so I brought in my two laptops and we used those to have the students create their videos. The students did two weeks of research and script writing for their infomercials before we started recording. The students worked in pairs for this project. When all of the videos were complete, we viewed them all in class and the students had to fill out answer surveys while they were watching other’s videos. The students thought of creative ways to portray their biomes and keep the audiences’ attention.
Impact
This project helped me use the skills I have learned throughout my master’s courses. Windows Movie Maker is a program that is easy to learn and teach, so the students were quickly able to start creating their videos with ease. I wish they would have been able to complete the videos on the school computers, because we could have gotten more done faster and been less rushed to complete them. The students really enjoyed being able to create their own videos and use the many editing tools in Movie Maker. I thought more students would have had experience with this program, but after finding out none of them were familiar with it, I was glad to be able to provide this experience to them.
The teacher that I helped had also never used Movie Maker before, so this was a great learning experience for her as well. After the project, she is now more confident and willing to try projects like these on her own in the future. This makes me feel like I really made a difference because not only did I create an engaging experience for this class of 7th graders, but also future classes because of the skills that the teacher has now.
Intent
I intend to make myself more available to the teachers in the building for projects such as this one. I was able to quickly set up this project based on my knowledge of Movie Maker and give the students, and teacher, a chance to work in a way they may not have been able to before. I would like to incorporate other small technology projects such as these in the younger grades at my school as well, so they are able to learn technology skills earlier and perhaps complete more complex technology projects when they are in the upper grades of our school.