Just Make a Movie About It (Not really)

There seems to be an exorbitant amount of excitement about the abundance of new presentation formats, apps, and websites that are being made readily available for educators to use in the classroom. Not a week goes by without news of a new, simple, free, online resource in which students and teachers can create movies, photo stories, interactive whiteboard presentations, digital puppet shows, or online posters.

While these digital presentation tools offer a variety of benefits, including increased student engagement, differentiated lesson planning options, multiple forms of assessment, authentic peer-to-peer collaboration and the opportunity for students to access material in a way that better suits particular learning styles, I am not convinced that those outcomes are being realized.

One issue is that many teachers do not have the time, experience or expertise to know how to make quality films or other digital media presentations, outside of the tried and true PowerPoint or Prezi. Consequently, asking teachers to begin implementing digital media into their curriculum as a presentation tool and encouraging students to use the same formats as a way to demonstrate learning would be akin to asking a film director or editor to adapt his or her film into a polished novel, and to do so in a week and a half's time without the help of a professional editor. It is a recipe for confusion, frustration, and some pretty painful presentations.

A second issue is that often times teachers seem to be unclear as to the purpose of assigning a multimedia presentation other than they have been encouraged to begin using technology in their practice because it is highly engaging for students. Their approach lacks purpose and therefore fosters an ineffective learning environment and misguided student products.

Creating media within an educational setting is much like consuming media in an educational setting. When showing a film to a class, teachers can either simply show the film, or guide students through the film with a series of well planned activities and a clearly communicated, purposeful set of desired learning outcomes. In the former scenario, students may or may not gain any knowledge, benefit or insight from the experience, while in the latter situation students enter the experience with a clearly defined purpose and are thus much more likely to benefit from the subject matter as it relates to the curriculum to which it is linked.

Having students create digital media requires a similar approach. Too often, teachers use digital media as simply a substitution for a traditional assessment. The thought is "instead of having my students write an essay, I will have them make a film about the topic". Students are not guided through the process in a way that allows them to identify and reflect upon the material they are working with or the learning process in which they are engaged. They are often being asked to simply use a digital format to summarize or prove that they accessed and understood specific information.

In this instance, teachers are allotting a much greater amount of class time, energy, and effort into a project that will produce an equivalent or possibly lower level of leaning than what traditionally occurs with a writing task.

Making an effective film or multimedia presentation takes time, planning, organization, collaboration, and a clear direction. All skills that our students need. With that understanding, if teachers are looking to incorporate complex technology driven projects into their curriculum, they need to allow themselves and their students the necessary time to benefit from all the facets that can be learned from such ambitious endeavors.

Additionally, if the future of academic and professional communication is going to be technology driven, then teachers need to create the expectation of well-planned, quality digital products and provide students with the time and skills necessary to be successful within that framework. Likewise, administrators and school districts need to provide teachers with the technology, training, and time to effectively make the transition to technology driven assessment.

A more deliberate approach to digital presentations will certainly extend the learning curve and the amount of time it takes to fully integrate technology into most teachers' practice, but it is essential to student success that while educators learn to adapt to technology, they also learn to adapt their expectations and standards of acceptable student work.

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