Beyond the Textbook: documentaries

[Frank W. Baker]

Documentaries can be great learning tools for students – and sometimes, their teachers. In a society where film is often the new “text”, educators are harnessing docs in innovative ways. Details in Canada's Point-of-View, special Education issue. 

 

 

[Alan Teasley]

Interesting article, Frank (at least the one on using docs in schools, which is the only one I read). Thanks for posting it. I'm not sure it fulfills on its promise of offering many "innovative ways" of using documentaries, but it does remind us that the usual connotation of the word "documentary" in its general, public use is "true." And sometimes "true" seems to promise "fair, balanced, and unbiased." If you spend much time with documentaries (as I'm doing now while in "selection season" for the FullFrame Documentary Film Festival), you quickly learn that documentaries are as varied as nonfiction print texts: diaries, biographies, essays, histories, debates, reportage, confessionals, and so forth. I am attaching a chart that lists 7 types or "genres" of documentaries and specific questions that work with each type of film. This hasn't been published anywhere yet, but it's something that has helped me sort through the plethora of films in the catchall category of documentary.

I have some handouts and filmographies on a web site: http://web.me.com/alanteasley/FilmTeach/Welcome.html
Click on Handouts and Presentations. Teachers are free to use these, though I do request that they give attribution to the various authors.