The recording and sharing of our personal and collective stories is an important part of how we learn how we live, and how we define ourselves as a people, community and as a nation. Exploring and documenting the stories that exist in a family and in a community is also a rich and meaningful way for students of all ages to make their own connections to history and culture and a powerful way to raise awareness of their own roles and possibilities as individuals.

One of our new initiatives with The Director in the Classroom is the Preserving Culture project. Working with students and teachers in North America, Africa and Asia, we have been assisting in the creation of, I believe, a truly meaningful learning experience for students, parents, teachers and community. It is wrapped around this simple premise:

Invite students to preserve the stories of today for the students of the future.

In our work with schools from Alaska to Auckland, we have found that students and teachers are extremely excited, motivated and proud of the work that is coming out of this kind of filmmaking project.

The six main benefits of a Student Produced Cultural Preservation Project are:

• Developing bridges between the past and the present through the interaction of student and family or community member.
• Exploring curricular objectives within the context of local relevance.
• Developing personal and interpersonal skills within the process of working in a group to produce a film.
• Developing technology skills within a real project.
• Developing awareness of place, community and self.
• Developing learning projects that extend beyond the classroom walls and into the family and community.

Here’s how it works.

The Ten Steps to Creating Student Cultural Preservation Filmmaking Projects

1. Brain Storm Ideas for who to record (local artists, historians, family members, etc) or what thematic ideas. (The history of the local railroad, immigration stories, etc). Answer the question: What will this film be about? 
2. Research availability of these people. Students book interview times.
3. Prepare for the interview with research, preparation of questions, and developing a shooting plan (where will they film, what will they film, who will be involved, what equipment will be required, where will that come from)
4. Consider what other kinds of material could be used to support the interview, for example photographs from that persons album, archival stills, film and audio from the local museum, archival photos, film and sound recordings available to students on the Web. (Free links & Resources on our site!) 
5. Practice with the video equipment to become familiar with setting up, recording, using a microphone, etc. Students can practice on each other using the questions they have developed. Help them develop good interview techniques and discuss open versus closed questions. 
6. Conduct the interview test with the subject at the location. Test that the video is playing back properly and the image is well lit and in focus. Test the audio to make sure it is recording (headphones are handy!) 
7. Record the interview. Students should refer to questions but always listen to answers and ask questions that take the answers further. Allow the subject to talk, don’t feel the need to rush in with questions. Most people need time to get comfortable in front of a camera. A relaxed pace is good for all parties. Don’t forget to thank the person when leaving, and have students send a thank you card the next day! 
8. Assemble the footage, adding still photographs, video clips of archival film or video segments, sound effects, music, or other audio, and allow time for a test screening. Make any revisions needed and export the project back to DV, and if you have the software, try creating a DVD. (Check out the story below on Placer California’s Cultural Preservation DVD that won 3rd place in the National Historical Competition). 
9. Create a duplicate DV tape of the original interview footage by recording from one DV camera to another. Make a DVD backup of the original footage by creating a DVD or burning a DVD using a DVD recorder. 
10. Distribute the final copies.
a. Send a DVD or VHS to the person that was interviewed, so that they and their family have a copy of the finished film. Also send them a DVD or DV of the complete unedited interview. 
b. Keep a DVD of the completed film in the school library and the original DV Interview tapes in the School Archive. Ideally, have two copies, just in case one is lost or damaged.
c. Send a DVD of the completed film as well as a duplicate DV of the complete unedited interview to the local museum for them to start building a Student Produced Archive of first person documents and documentaries of the community.

So by doing this, what have we accomplished?

We have provided students with an authentic, real world experience and project which will benefit the students through increased awareness of the stories, culture and history of their community as well as benefiting the community as pieces of history are preserved for future learners. In this scenario, a student ten or twenty years from now who is creating a media project on, for example, farming in their community, could access and incorporate video footage of farms or of farmers circa 2005, though both farmers and farms may be long gone. And the sources of their learning, of their digital resources, are the students of today. Wouldn’t it be cool for students to put together a film project using footage from the past that their parents recorded as part of their own learning? This is part of the powerful long view potential of this project.

And the ambitious project continues by recording one story at a time. I encourage you to consider a filmmaking project like this with your students. Keep it simple. See what happens. And if you have any questions, give us a shout.

Download the complete Preserving Your Culture PDF resource here