Thank you, everyone!
Angus, we draw on a lot of research from educational psychology, where
they are
better about actually measuring the outcomes and effects of these teaching
strategies, but pair it with the more descriptive and illustrative work
we read
in Teaching Sociology.
Both my co-author and I use both full-length features (both popular media and
documentaries) and clips in our courses. The first part of the title of the
paper is "Sometimes Less is More" and we offer various reasons that it
might be
better to use clips in some instances - not only for the obvious
reasons of time
constraints and to leave opportunities for discussion, but also to cut down on
"seductive details" (unimportant aspects that might draw students' attention
away from what they need to be paying attention to), to reduce cognitive load,
to build interest but also to keep students focused on what's important.
We discuss the importance of setting up any length of media - whether a
clip or
a film - to let students know what they're looking for or how this might fit
into what they're learning, even very abstractly, so they don't just passively
consume like they do often do at home. Giving them a schema. In my summer
inequality courses, I finish up each week with a movie that deal with the
topics we've dicussed and that's all the information I give the students; in
other classes I specifically ask them to draw on key terms or concepts from
readings and so forth that we list before class.
Jessica L. Collett, M.A.
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
Tucson, Arizona 85721-0027
http://www.members.cox.net/~jessica.collett
--
"Creativity is to intellectual life what speed is to sport. You can't teach or
train it. You can only try to stay out of its way." ~ Henry A. Walker
Quoting "D. Angus Vail" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
Hi, Jessica and other dear teachers:
As one who uses full films rather than clips, my big question is
whether you
use sociological data along with psychological data? I'm hoping--and
assuming--you do, but since you only mention psych sources, I've
gotta ask. As
sociologists, psychologists tend to make great psychologists.
The reason I prefer full films to clips is that clips do not
present context
especially well and without context it's kinda difficult to do sociology. Of
course, with a film like crash (or 21 Grams or any of the other non-linear
films in that style), it's kinda hard to present context too, but eliminating
it altogether sounds problematic to me. Do you address that issue?
As always, A.
D. Angus Vail
Department of Sociology
Willamette University
900 State Street
Salem, OR 97301
Phone: 503.370.6313
Fax: 503.370.6512
"It's not enough to know that things work.
The laurels go to those who can show HOW they work."
-------------------------
From: _"Jessica L. Collett" _
To: _"Teach Soc Listserv (E-mail)" _
Subject: _TEACHSOC: clips vs. full-length films_
Date: _Fri, 6 Jan 2006 07:50:48 -0700_
I know I am weighing in late, but I found the thread about Crash, that
subsequently turned into a discussion about the benefits and drawback of
popular media, fascinating.
A colleague and I actually wrote a paper last year about a similar subject.
Drawing from research in education psychology, we show that the
integration of
popular media is an effective teaching tool, but that clips are better than
full-length presentations. After detailing psychological reasons for both of
these findings, we offer ideas for how to effectively integrate clips into
sociology classes.
The paper was recently bounced from Teaching Sociology and we're
looking for a
new outlet. Yet, following this discussion, it clearly seems like something
that would be of interest to sociologists. Does anyone know of
another outlet
we could send it to?
Thanks,
Jessica
Jessica L. Collett, M.A.
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
Tucson, Arizona 85721-0027
http://www.members.cox.net/~jessica.collett
--
"Creativity is to intellectual life what speed is to sport. You
can't teach or
train it. You can only try to stay out of its way." ~ Henry A. Walker
