My in-situ experience at Marysville Elementary was both exciting and enlightening. I was eager to witness how the students would channel their creativity to craft stop motion videos. Amanda and I were paired together, and were responsible for guiding a group of three enthusiastic students. Although they displayed excitement for the project, they were unsure about the concept or plot of their video. As a result, our group’s use of imagination wasn’t as extensive as some others, but the students still enjoyed their time collaborating with Amanda and me. Next we had chosen the setting for the stop motion video which was a window sill, this created an ideal backdrop for making it appear as though the students’ desk pets were situated outdoors. The students were enthusiastic about manipulating their desk pets, occasionally moving them too rapidly. However, this provided us with an opportunity to slow down the stop motion, extending the duration of the video.
My previous week working alongside Amanda and Krista in our classroom, we swiftly developed a basic storyline using the props and characters available to us. Our approach during the creative process was a well-coordinated effort. Krista managed the task of capturing photos on the stop motion app, while Amanda and I carefully moved the characters to bring the story to life. In the end, our video turned out quite well. While I do wish we had incorporated music into our project, the overall experience was amazing and incredibly enjoyable.
Comparing these experiences shows me how different stop motion can be with age. I think that with younger students, their videos were a bit less organized and more unstructured. When working with adults, we fully mapped out a storyline before creating the stop motion. Another thing I noticed is that the students were so excited to move their desk pets that they ended up making larger increments in their movements compared to the group I worked with previously, consisting of adults. The students had not yet grasped the concept that we needed to make small movements to make the stop motion appear realistic.
In my personal opinion, I think we were given the perfect amount of time to execute the stop motion videos; however, I would have liked for students to create a storyline before Amanda and I had shown up. Having this portion of the stop motion lesson ready would have made the process much faster and created a better structure when creating the video.
The types of themes and topics I would like my class to create a stop motion video about would most likely be a topic that we are covering in class. It would be beneficial to teach digital literacy within a classroom and ask students to write a story about how to be safe with technology. By having students connect to something they have just been taught, it might resonate more within their memory.
In the images and video is how our in-situ at Marysville Elementary School went, including our students very own stop motion video!
Overall, here is a great video on how to teach stop motion to your students: