Passport to the Internet

Step 1 - Choosing Your Module

By the time you are at this stage of your project, you ought to have been divided into groups of five. The first thing you and your group must do is some research. There are a lot of internet safety issues for children and teenagers, and what you need to do is choose three that your group's video will focus on.



Step 2 - Getting Organized

The first thing you need to do is assign roles within your group. Since you're going to be writing, filming, and editing a movie, you're going to need to decide which group members are good at each specific job. Our recommendation is that you break the group into three parts:

Creative team: This team is going to focus on writing the script. Remember that what you write is going to be performed by students from the elementary school. Someone that has an aptitude for creativity should be on this team.

Directing team: This team is focused on the actual directing of the movie. It would be a good idea to put someone who is good at interacting with children on this team so as to make the filming a smooth process.

Editing team: This team is going to do the post-filming editing. The people on this team should be good at using the editing software, so that you all can efficiently edit and clean up your videos to be ready for completion.


Step 3 - Getting started

Now that your group has their three specific issues decided and your members assigned to a role, you all need to brainstorm about how you want to make your movie. There are several things to consider at this point:

1. You have two objectives in making this film. First of all, you are informing the audience (people who go to the website and view your video) about some of the issues surrounding internet safety. They have to know about what's dangerous before they can be safe, right? The second thing you need to do in your movie is tell your audience how they can be safe from the dangers you're showing them.

2. Your actors are elementary school students. Your group is going to be paired with a group of students at one of the elementary schools. These students' teachers are going to be talking to them about internet safety, so they will be familiar with some of the issues they will be acting about. Your group should take into consideration that you already have designated actors for the script you write.

3. You have a lot of creative freedom with this film, so don't let this suggestion restrict you. But it may be a good idea to have one "mini-clip" for each of the three issues you have. You may want to have a 1-2 minute scene showing someone running into a problem, then showing how to deal with it appropriately. This isn't the way you have to do this, but it's an idea for a starting point for those of you that may be stuck. 


Step 4 - Filming

Once your group has a finished script and a plan for how to do editing, you need to start making preparations for the filming. We will take several class periods and drive over to the elementary school to do filming. This trip is largely organized by the teachers, but there are a few things you need to do in the mean time:

1. All of the group members need to talk to one of the teachers about getting a camera. We have checked them out from the school technology department already. You all need to have a crash course on how to use and respect the equipment before you can use it on your own though. These are expensive pieces of equipment, so you'll need to be careful with them.

2. Once you have your camera and your script, you need to do some preliminary planning. You're going to be working with 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders. You need to decide how you're going to assign the roles, how to direct, where you want to film, etc. The students' teachers are going to be there to help keep them focused, but you should have a plan before you arrive at the elementary school.

3. Once you have completed the editing and have a completed video, you will all have an opportunity to share it with this class. You and your class mates will be expected to critique the videos, at which time you may decide to make some revisions.

4. Once your group is in agreement on the contents and quality of your video, you will turn it into your teacher and she will deliver all the projects to the School Board for judging after they have been graded for this class.


Final Thought:

Each groups' video will be reviewed by judges comprised of teachers and school board members. The video that does the best job of teaching and promoting internet safety will be featured on the Watauga county school website for all to see. You can use the rubric, under the "Evaluation" Tab to make sure you have met the highest standards of the assessment tool used by the judges.