Fortunately, at the same time, I was teaching a Black Rocket technology camp hosted by Hawkeye Community College titled, "Minecraft Animators". This was helpful because I was able to show my students there an example of my own storyboard as they were beginning to plan out their animations! This week was a culminating week for me as my summer graduate classes were finishing up and this was my final technology camp at Hawkeye Tech for the summer.
The most challenging aspect of this project was the fact that school was not in session at the time. I usually like to use students for instructional videos but was not teaching any preschool aged children at the time. Additionally, we cannot access our classrooms during the summer. Therefore, my storyboard settings didn't end up being in my final video due to some of these logistics. I was able to find a friend's set of children who were close to the appropriate age and up for doing some acting. Another challenge was a person who has plenty of footage of my classroom, was out of the country and did not have access to any of that video.
Next time I make an instructional video, I will use my own students during the school year, with parental permission.
I was very glad I had some video editing experiences before this project! I have created videos in the past similar to this. I did not feel intimidated by the project because of that. Knowing once I had the footage, I could manipulate it and plug it in how I wanted also made me feel less frustrated when the child actors were not quite perfect. Last time I made an instructional video, I did have access to a higher quality microphone. I will try to find a better recording device for my next video.
If you happen to be assigned a project like this, or want to create an instructional video for your classroom, I suggest browsing videos to start with! Also, if you are going to take the time to create a video, make sure the focus of the video is something you can use in your classroom. With many of my graduate projects throughout this cohort, I have tried to do just that!
Check out the final product below:
Jill, thanks for the thoughts! I understand it can be difficult to find student subjects during the summer, so I was glad to hear you had a generous friend and willing kids to fill in :) Also, I'm glad you were able to share your storyboarding process with your summer group! The planning process alone is a lot of upper-level thinking and processing, which is a good fit for any classroom. Thanks for including your video in the post too!
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