Making Movies to Demonstrate a Process

The students have traditionally demonstrated a step-by-step project for their classmates. This project usually consisted of bringing in all the materials, writing the steps and reading them to the class while acting out their demonstration which range from “How to Make Tacos” to “How to Make a Free Throw” or “How to Draw Mickey Mouse”. This year, we changed the format to include the authoring of a slide show using Windows Movie Maker. The students still brought in all the materials for the demonstration, but this time, they drew a storyboard with each box of the storyboard being a step in the process. These would serve as guidance for the pictures to be taken. The students demonstrated the process while a friend takes pictures of each step using a digital camera. These pictures were uploaded to Windows Movie Maker. The students then took turns recording their voices telling each step in their process into Movie Maker. The students also needed to add title and credit slides, as well as use the transition and editing features of Windows Movie Maker. The final step was to coordinate the pictures and sound so that they were hearing the step for the picture being shown.

The entire project, beginning to end, will take about 10 class periods.