Our courses are designed to make sure that each student must consume all of the content themselves. Students will need internet access and a computer or phone to watch all the videos and work on all the worksheets. We track the level of completion for all students to ensure that they’ve watched every single video and downloaded every single assignment/worksheet. Each student has their own individualized access with a user ID and password that they must log into to consume the content. For that reason, it doesn’t make sense that one student in the group has a login that other students can use. In that case there is no way to confirm that the student gets what they came for.
The Value of Digital Literacy Education to Schools
While there remains a necessity to teach traditional school subjects, there must also be a priority on teaching 21st century skill sets to meet the demands of the future. Most students are obsessed with social media, and are already using their smartphones to tell stories to their friends and followers. While students have the technological tool to make videos that connect with the community, they don’t have the training in how to have a powerful voice on community issues that are important to them. Schools and organizations are using Filmmaking For Good to create user generated content from their students. In our courses, the students can pick any social issues to make a video about. With that said, they can also be given or assigned a topic, including making videos about the school/organizations for their use for marketing/social media platforms. Our assignments usually spark the imagination and ignite the passion of our students.
We recognize that educators want to teach students video production, but don’t necessarily have the professional training to lead a focused, consistent and comprehensive learning experience to the students. We want to teach them not how to make one single video, but rather how to use their digital media skills for the betterment of the community ongoingly.
How Does the Filmmaking For Good Curriculum Work?
Filmmaking For Good is a tool for educators to engage students inside of a larger educational experience that they are delivering. It is most ideally meant as a group activity, with a number of small groups of students getting together to make a short video about an issue or cause that the group members are passionate about. For instance, if a college classroom has 100 students, they would be broken into 20 groups of 5 students to make a total of 20 videos in the classroom. Each student would pay for individual access to our FFG.com course (i.e. $59.95/student), and all 20 of that classroom’s videos will qualify to win our prize money. While our courses can be done by students individually (without an educator facilitating), that is not necessarily the spirit in which it was designed. Our experience shows that it is very difficult to get students to finish the entire course unless it’s mandatory inside of a classroom or educational setting. We know that many educators out there are teaching literacy and social media to their students, from middle school and high school to college. We have done implementations with organizations ranging from The Girl Scouts and The Boys and Girls Club, to Florida International University and Princeton. In each case, we collaborated with a specific educator who used our materials to teach a segment about media production inside of their classes. Filmmaking For Good is a turnkey project-based learning experience made to be embedded inside an educator agenda or syllabus.
What are Eyes On Your Mission (EOYM) and Filmmaking For Good (FFG)?
The Eyes On Your Mission Project is an American 501(C3) nonprofit that works at the intersection of video production and social change. We empower youth and communities to actualize positive change through access to media technology, production skills and digital storytelling. Previously we were in the classroom teaching youth and working with students hands-on as a direct service organization. In 2019 we teamed up with Two Parrot Productions to create a new curriculum, “Filmmaking For Good” to scale our work. Instead of working with one classroom at a time, we can be in thousands of classrooms at a time.