An Experiment in Action Learning

The posts linked below on RateMyMates  are the result of a wee experiment with my students in 1F. Instead of using the usual direct teaching methods to cover the topic of school I asked the students to work in groups to produce either a film or a radio show.
The aim of the production was to introduce German-speaking visitors to The Gordon Schools; to give an idea about its history, the subjects studied, give some opinions, some interviews etc. The only real guideline I gave them was to use the vocabulary from their vocab guides to ensure reasonable quality German. You can see/hear the results for yourselves but here is my own analysis of how the experiment went.

1. I allowed it to go on for too long, although much of the time was down to various disruptions
2. some level of direct teaching is involved beforehand to ensure some familiarity with the labguage to be used
3. I'm not sure how much of the language they have learned
4. there are some fantastic ideas in there which with a little tweaking could produce really high quality work, both language-wise and creatively
5. once again just when you are getting brassed off and you think they are taking the mick the students come up with the goods...in general.
6. the script is king, queen, emperor and general dictator all rolled into one
7. on the whole THEY HAD A BALL..look at the bloopers at the end of the films

Will I do it again? YES, but with the above in mind.

Please leave 2 stars and a wish-type comments on their work!!!

Der_BJKKM_Shau

Die_Gordon_Schule

Ein_Tag_in_der_Gordon_Schule

Comments

[Chris]

Hi Adam,

I think we've been leading fairly similar lives over the last few weeks, and I have to say I completely agree with your evaluation. Last October in the Isle of WIght I heard Mark Pentleton emphasise just how key the script is to projects, and that really is true.

My year 9s have just made videos about their opinions on school. Surprisingly in some ways, but not in others, it was the least motivated member of the class who really came up trumps, simply because he got to use Movie Maker. Once I'd got the script out of him he was happy to record it just so he could play around with effects etc, but at least the work got done, and well.

A big learning curve,

Chris