In what ways does teaching with/about film promote higher order thinking skills?

[Frank W. Baker]

I am interested in hearing from teachers about this question. Thanks. Frank Baker, media educator, webmaster, The Media Literacy Clearinghouse

[Chrissy Harris]

I teach American Literature to juniors. When I am teaching some of the Romantic writers (Poe, Hawthorne, Irving, etc.), I teach my students to identify the elements of suspense. We analyze each story and discuss ways in which the author created suspense. Once we have discussed these classic writers, I move on to a Stephen King short story and an Alfred Hitchcock film. I go over and discuss ways a director creates suspense in a film. We usually watch Rear Window and discuss analyzed the elements of suspense used by Hitchcock. The culminating assessment for this unit is for my students to bring a clip from a movie or t.v. show, present it to the class, and discuss the elements of suspense they found and how they create suspense. This is a great way to show my students that analyzing literature in class is very similar to analyzing something they watch. By the end of the year, I always have several students tell me that when they watch movies, they automatically analyze the music, lighting, camera angles, and other aspects. They usually are very excited because it gives them a whole different way of watching movies. I think being able to not only analyze what we read, but to also analyze what we watch (since that is what most kids do) definitely promotes higher order thinking skills.

[Hellen Harvey]

Please visit my film site for some info on this. I had a recent enlightening experience while teaching The Great Gatsby. I was reading the first chapters to my on level Juniors. I knew that they were having trouble visualizing a novel that takes place in the 20s despite the prereading activities I used. I was going to show one of the versions of the film, but since both are rather poor adaptations, I decide to let my classes choose their version. We discussed the reasons for their choices, which ended up in some indepth discussions that I could not have gotten with simple questioning strategies. They drew on the facts and descriptions that they remembered from the readings and coupled them with their rather savvy interpretations of visual text. For example, when choosing one film because they liked Daisy as she was portrayed led them to try to verbalize what they had gained of her character from the book. This was very affirming of the power of film in teaching literature and higher order thinking.

[Frank W. Baker]

Thanks. Have you visited my Media Literacy Clearinghouse site; with a complete section on film?

[Joan Porter]

My 11's just finished viewing FREEDOM WRITERS DIARY. We spent some time talking about the language of anger, and the language of hurt in each culture. They had to identify ten higher level adjectives to describe the teacher, and one other character in the film, and they find that challenging. They were asked if holocausts were still happening in the world today, and that question stumped them, for they thought there was only one. A one page reflection that did not involve re-tellling the story was required . They had to identify the most emotional scene in the film and defend their choice. Lastly, they had to determine under what circumstances they would "protect one's own." They said the assignment is not lengthy, but it makes them think, and figure out how to articulate those thoughts. Open-ended questions promote higher level thinking, and film assists with the development of those skills.
THE DEAD POETS SOCIETY served as the springboard for the question, "Who was responsible for Neil Perry's death?", followed by the question, " Why did Neil not walk away from the situation- why was he unable to think beyond the moment?"
Gulliver's Travels was attached to the concept of self-actualization, when one realizes who they really are and what they believe/perceive to be their personal truth, and how questioning one's own beliefs and challenging the beliefs of others is a good process.
My students have always been responsive to thinking, questioning, and the analysis associated with film.

[YM Harris]

I'm teaching 12 Angry Men in my Senior English classes - My intention is to watch both the 1957 and the 1997 versions of the film and discuss the film itself (angles, lighting and such) as well as what changes when the casting gets radically reshaped. I've never taught a film course and will be looking at the two sites referenced above. Any comments or advice? The students will have already read and acted out the script itself by the time we start watching the films, and I want to get beyond very basic comparison and contrast in the questioning and writing about the film.

[Frank W. Baker]

YM Harris: Thanks for this response. Lately, I have been introducing screenplays and storyboads to the teachers and students I work with. Working in groups, I introduce screenplay codes and conventions as well as the look and purpose of the storyboard. I have them read a passage from a novel, and then create both the "screenplay" and the "storyboard" of that scene. You might even be able to find the screenplay for both versions online. This web page from the British Film Institute may also be helpful. After participants have created their storyboards, I ask them to share with class...and finally, I will show that scene from the film and the actual screenplay script.

[J. D. Wilson, Jr.]

I use film to encourage students to draw connections between different stories. I will have students read Oliver Twist and then show the film Empire of the Sun that has similar situations, characters and themes, as well as important differences. I match Le Morte d'Arthur (the grail sequence) with the film The Natural, The Crucible with the original Frank Sinatra version of The Manchurian Candidate, Huckleberry Finn with Casablanca, Gulliver's Travels with The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, The Last of the Mohicans with The Searchers, and Light in August with The Big Sleep (mainly because Faulkner did the screenplay). I like doing this because the film does not become a substitute for reading the book and encourages students to see how elements of story telling appear in different contexts.

COrdially,
J. D.

[Denee Tyler]

How do you tie The Manchurian Candidate to The Crucible? Inquiring minds want to know. I'm trying to think of connections, but all I really remember is the Queen of Hearts.

[J. D. Wilson, Jr.]

The husband of "The Queen of Hearts" (the Angela Lansbury character) is a McCarthy-esque senator. The Queen is an agent of the Communist Chinese who is trying to get her husband elected president. The character is exploiting the nation's fear of communism to get and agent for the communists elected president as the young girls in The Crucible are exploiting the people of Salem's fear of the devil to get what they want. The film attacks the McCarthy witch hunts in much the same way Miller's play does. Hope this helps.

Cordially,
J. D.

[Colin Flynn]

In my AP Lit and Comp class, I have my students do a film unit in which we discuss camera angle, movement, sound, lighting, mise en scene, etc. Then we analyze Citizen Kane. I think it really helps them see how the different techniques contribute to the overall meaning of the film. My AP kids struggle mightily connecting technique to meaning, especially on the open question of the exam. When I start to mention the parallels between film techniques and literary techniques, they often have a eureka moment. I have noticed that their ability to not only locate technique in writing is improved, but explain what that technique is doing for the overall meaning of the work. At this point they are definitely doing higher order thinking, application and synthesis for sure.

For example, during the scene in Citizen Kane when Charles Foster Kane is signing away his fortune, he stands and walks away from the camera toward a bank of windows and then returns. At the beginning of the scene the windows look as though they are a normal distance from the floor. However, as Kane walks toward them, we realize that the windows are actually more than six feet from the floor. When he stands in front of these now enormous windows, he is absolutely diminished. Through the use of deep focus, Orson Welles is able to keep everything in the shot in focus and illustrates just how defeated and broken Kane is at that moment. The technique (deep focus and mise en scene) MAKES the meaning (Kane's admission of his insignificance) in that scene in the same way irony or simile or sound devices do in literature.

[Frank W. Baker]

Colin, I was so impressed with you analysis of the scene in CK (that you mentioned) that I went back and grabbed the frames of that scene, and created a handout referencing your analysis. Here is the link. I hope others will use it as well. Frank