My students are making movies. It’s one of my favorite projects of the year: inspired by StoryCorps, students record interviews with someone from an older generation, often grandparents or friends of their families, and then create short documentary videos based on material from the interview. Students narrate the video and include clips from the interview along with visual material to support their narrative. It’s challenging for students because it pushes them way outside of their comfort zones. Asking 8th graders to conduct extended, >30 minute, interviews with adults is a stretch to begin with. Then they have to identify a theme to focus on, write a script for the narration, find visuals (scanning photographs, finding internet materials, etc.), and master the technical tools to put it all together. Finally they share their movies with the class, often an excruciating moment for the neophyte auteurs.

All this exposition to provide context for the following conversation in class yesterday:

Mr. Roy: One of the roles of your introduction is to establish the mood and tone of your movie. Generally you want to be consistent, so if you’re telling a dark story, you don’t want to have a light, bubbly intro with goofy music.

<A student, let’s call him Joe, raises his hand, with a thoughtful expression.>

Mr. Roy: Yes, Joe?

Joe: What if you want to have contrast?

Mr. Roy: Say more about that.

Joe: I was thinking of trying to juxtapose my grandfather’s carefree childhood with the losses he faced later.

Mr. Roy: <silent> <mouth hanging open> Ummm, yes, that sounds … freaking awesome. If you can use “juxtapose” in a sentence, you can and should ignore everything I’m saying.

Keep in mind that Joe is a 13-year-old boy. I’m looking forward to his movie!