Choreography

YouTube now provides us with access to other schools/theatre groups who have performed the same musical. The Director (my husband Miles) and the backstage crew have trawled the web for the best examples of choreography for each song, and we have ‘borrowed’ the bits we like to supplement what was already in our minds. It has saved a lot of time, and we can watch the videos as many times as we need to get a particular set of moves down.

Video Trailers

Every Grade 6 student has a role to play in this musical, and we simply couldn’t do it with our backstage crew. A couple of them have created video trailers for the show to promote interest, and one student is producing weekly videos for our school newsletter to keep the community informed of our progress. These have proven to be engaging and above all, entertaining, for the grade 6 students and our school community. We have used iMovie extensively for this purpose.

Filming

Our talented backstage crew are also helping out with filming rehearsals, and assisting our Digital Media Specialist in manning the cameras for the actual performances.

Google Apps

The backstage crew have created surveys using Google Forms to source costumes, and have used Google Docs extensively to organise and share resources. A spreadsheet was created with a cast list and costuming needs, as well as documents with videos for choreography (including how to learn to waltz for one particular scene), images for face painting ideas, and a list of props needed for each scene. The shared editing feature has been invaluable for backstage organisation.

Tickets & Posters

Students have produced tickets and posters for the show using Pages, which have helped publicize it around our school.

I am proud of the way students are taking ownership throughout the show, including taking on the roles of stage managers, lighting, sound and PR. This is what we want our Middle School students to be doing, and technology is helping them along the way.

Today, Maggie is wearing a button on her shirt which says, “Do one thing every day that scares you” (Eleanor Roosevelt), which sums up how she’s feeling as we embark on this project!

Firstly, she asked the students to go to http://pdcomedy.com/ to choose a video that they wanted to create the background music for. She recommended the cartoons and the silent movies on the site as the best for our purposes.

Students downloaded a video of their choice, then added them to Acid Music Studio 7.
(This is the composition programme we have on the lab PC computers, however you could do exactly the same thing in GarageBand with a Mac.)

From there, they decide on loops and sound effects which will complement their film.

The kids are absolutely loving it. I hope to have some samples to share with you when they are finished.

Established to offer students the chance to showcase their creative ideas, talent and skills through film, the SISFF received more than 100 entries. Films were entered in one of four categories – Public Service Announcement, Video Art, Narrative and Documentary – across Primary, Middle and High School age groups. Students came from a range of international schools, which gave them a unique opportunity to share and exchange great ideas while being immersed in global and multicultural experiences.

I had the pleasure of working on the committee, and through my involvement got to meet a whole lot of new and interesting people. It was a really great experience, and I can’t wait to get going on next year’s festival.

I am proud to announce that one of my Grade 5 students – Jean-Luc – won the technical award for Best Animation, which, considering his entry came from a project I considered one of my failures, was the icing on the cake for me!

I hope you enjoy the top 3 winners as much as I do:

Best in Show

1st Runner up

2nd Runner up (reminiscent of Flight of the Conchords)

I have to also include the winner of Best Cinematography, as it’s such a visually stunning film

And last, but by no means least, Jean-Luc’s winning entry for Best Animation

Of course in this busy life we all lead, finding time to write thank you letters is a tricky business. Cue technology!

First up we hopped onto Facebook and created video messages of thanks. If you have a webcam it should be remarkably straightforward. Just go to ‘compose message’, click on the video button and record!

The quality isn’t brilliant, but the ease of use definitely makes up for that (image below)

For those not on Facebook, we used the Voice Memos app on the iPhone to record a very simple message of thanks.

Clicking on the red circle starts and stops recording, and then you can email the mp4 file wherever you want.

Check out a sample thank you below!

I promise you, this took hardly any time at all, and I know the people who received their digital thank yous absolutely loved them!