We survived, but what will become of us?

03Dec09

So, the last week of classes is here–which means papers, projects, and presentations galore. In DSC101, my students successfully finished their commentary projects, and they are rightfully proud of their work. Not all the groups were able to sustain the analysis throughout the entire length of their films, perhaps because of time management and pre-planning [...]

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Midterm in Discover

03Oct09

Sadly, I’ve been less-than-dilligent about posting to this teaching blog–in part because of the chaos of my recent move, but also because this term has been busier in the classroom than most. My students seem to be slowing down a little, which isn’t surprising around this time of year; nonetheless, I think each group is [...]

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Discussing Film Form

28Aug09

I was very impressed with my Discover 101 students today, who seemed really to get into the film analysis portion of our class–we watched the first ten minutes of Night of the Living Dead, and used it as a springboard for discussing some of the basic concepts of film analysis, locating patterns, key elements in [...]

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Night of the Living Dead

27Aug09

Tomorrow in Anatomy of a Film, I’m planning to show a clip from Night of the Living Dead that should work as a good springboard for a discussion of the key elements of film form, which students should have read. We’ll discuss conventions and prior experience; the way we register emotion within the film and [...]

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Overcoming the First Day Syllabus Blues

24Aug09

I’m determined, this term, to not fall into either the 1.) going-over-the-syllabus-the-first-day cop-out or the 2.) jump-right-in-to-lecture cop-out, both of which so often become standards (usually because we’re so busy prepping courses, finishing syllabi, or participating in the pipe-dream of having all the basic course plans for the entire rest of the term in some  [...]

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