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!

Below is a collection of quotes from student reflections in my eighth grade social studies classes. There’s no real rhyme or reason to them; some are deep, others funny, others absurd. I added line breaks and corrected a few typos.

That’s what makes history so interesting,
the emotions that intertwine with the facts.

I am naturally good at
understanding stuff.

I love it when in group conversations there is a debate but the person with the best facts can show the other person how they are right, even if I was the one that was wrong.

Just like in science,
you can’t say something
without data.

I absolutely hate margin noting
more than I hate Activision
for making the same game
every year and brainwashing
people to buy that game.

In class, we learn about the history of our country, but notice, the class itself is not called “history,” but instead called social studies. This is because we are also learning about current and relevant events that affect us today. I can take the things we learn and connect them with things I see every day.

I have lots of opinions
and they are all
grounded in evidence.

I really want to work on speaking up more in class, and not being afraid of judgement when stating my opinion. I chose this skill because being able to talk in front of peers/people is very important, and one day I want to be a really good speaker. This class is the perfect opportunity to practice.

I know all the historical facts.

I am proud of how immersed
I am in the materials we study.

I have always been a crazy reader.

Remember that time where I corrected you on the start date of the revolutionary war? (No offense.) When I saw the incorrect date I thought back to my times in Assassin’s Creed III and remembered the date of the attack on Lexington and Concord (4/19/1775, my birthday) and my ego light bulb went off and I thought “Aha!!! My video games have brought me a point of extra credit!!!

Sometimes I am not the most thorough person.

I memorize facts by trying to use them
in outside-of-class situations instead
of just memorizing them for a test.

I am pretty good with speaking up in class,
though sometimes I do ask pretty dumb questions.

I think the trimester went pretty well,
though in the middle I kind of got lazy.

Sometimes I have trouble
paying attention to what
others are saying.

It is still a developing skill for me to take other perspectives, since I usually stay grounded in my own strong opinion and it is hard to get out.

It was really fun,
because when you know the facts,
you can ask a lot more questions,
and you are able to debate the truth.

I think it’s hard to have an opinion without evidence, and that’s why I have a lot of screenshots of conversations in my phone.

One last thing.
I recently realized
how amazing my
NASA poster is.
I mean
just look at it.

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Every November, as our first trimester draws to a close, I ask my students to write reflections on how the trimester went for them. I have some broad prompts like, “Describe your strengths in social studies,” and “Describe at least one specific skill you want to work on next trimester,” followed by a section where students rate themselves on various skills (reading, discussion, writing, using evidence, etc.). Finally, they give themselves a letter grade and explain why they think they’ve earned it. It’s the culminating assignment of the trimester, and I depend heavily on it while writing narrative reports and making decisions about borderline grades.

I love reading these reflections because most students take them very seriously and I learn a lot about them, their goals, and their perceptions of their strengths and weaknesses. This, in turn, provides me with a lens to consider how well I have communicated the goals and skills required for the class. I am most successful when my students’ self-evaluations are congruent with my own perceptions.