The CLC staff would like to wish all of our schools, and their pupils and teachers, a very Happy Christmas. We look forward to working with you again in 2008. The Autumn Term has been very busy at the City Learning Centre. Students from 7 Secondary Schools, 21 Primary Schools, and 2 Special Schools, have attended CLC sessions during the term:
During the Autumn Term, two groups of Year 10 GCSE Art students from Colton Hills Community College and The King’s School visited the CLC for three-day digital photography projects. Some of the imagery created by the students from both schools was stunning.
Here’s a showcase of some of the images created by the students:
During the second and third days of the project, Year 10 GCSE Art students from Colton Hills Community School visited the urban centre of Wednesfield to take photos around the theme of “Natural and Manmade”.
Upon returning to the CLC, the students were shown a variety of techniques for improving their photos, from effective cropping to more sophisticated effects using adjustment layers and filters. The students then used Flickr.com to share and annotate their photos.
In the final day of the project, students created video portfolios of their work in iMovie, combining together music, photos and text to create simple, effective showcases for their digital imagery.
For the next three days, I’m working with Year 10 students from Colton Hills Community School on a digital photography project. We will be looking at the technical side of digital photography (shutter speed, aperture, using focus lock, depth of field) and at ideas for effective composition (e.g. the “Rule of Thirds”). As the students take, edit and evaluate their photos, they will publish them to Flickr and learn how to organise and annotate their photos online.
Here are the student activities for Day One:
Mindmapping - what makes a good photo?
A technical intro to how cameras work - aperture, shutter speed, depth of field, focus
A shooting challenge - students shoot photos around the CLC demonstrating low depth of field, high depth of field and focal lock
Uploading images to Flickr, adding new photos, creating sets, annotating and tagging photos
How to compose a photo - “the rule of thirds”, viewpoint, story-telling, simplicity
Walking into Wednesfield on a scouting visit for locations, and taking shots.
From the 20th - 22nd Nov, three groups of Year 7 students from Smestow Specialist Sports College attended sessions at the CLC as part of their Citizenship / PSHE programme of work. During the sessions, students participated in a variety of activities - mindmapping, using the voting systems and using Immersive Education’s Kar2ouche software - to think about issues related to discrimination in British society. Students created soap opera stories in Kar2ouche to explore how real-life students might handle and combat discrimination in a school environment.
What the teachers said:
Pupils have enjoyed their learning experience. They have become more confident in using the computers. Pupils have learned more about discrimination and were able to put their experiences across. They worked effectively in groups and showed very good team work.
Very well presented, full of pace and students were engaged throughout.
Disclaimer: The opinions presented here are those of the author alone. They in no way represent the opinions of Wolverhampton CLC, Wolverhampton Local Authority or Wolverhampton City Council.
