The British Film Institute.

www.bfi.org.uk/education/ teaching/

Film, television, and video are part of today's visual culture, and incorporating the moving image into an art classroom can engage students while building media literacy. The British Film Institute's Web site explores various gateways into the study of film, and while many of the teacher resources on this site must be ordered, two downloadable PDFs (require Adobe Acrobat Reader) provide basic strategies for working with film, along with suggestions for each area of the curriculum, including visual arts.

"Look Again" is designed for ages three to eleven, and a representative strategy involves stopping the action of a film and asking the following questions: "What and/ or who can you see in the shot?" "Where do you think the camera is?" "What can you tell about the time/place/setting?" "What can you tell about the characters from how they are dressed?" These are much like questions one could ask students looking at a painting, for example. Links to the Art and Design curriculum include discussion of the use of shapes and patterns, color, and animation techniques. Puppetry and storyboarding activities are suggested, as well as the use of computer software; for example, making sequences of a single color or shape, scanning images, and adding music for multimedia projects.

For secondary art and design teachers, techniques of animation, abstraction, and researching visual influences are expanded upon in "Moving Images in the Classroom." Discussion topics for older students include representations of gender, class, and disability, the intent of the filmmaker, and the audience response. Suggested projects include student production of films, animation sequences, and multimedia presentations, as well as experimentation with camera angles, and manipulation of digital images. In both of these resources, case studies provide examples of how film can be linked to the study of fine and commercial art in the classroom.