Video Project

I was inspired to make this project by a chapter in Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass, during which she describes having her students go to the school’s greenhouse and identify all the stages of growth on a squash plant to deepen and reinforce their understanding of how fruits grow. My educational background is in biology, so this is of personal interest to me and develops a student’s research and editing skills as well as deepening their knowledge of biological development. This is the kind of assignment I would develop if collaborating with a biology faculty member on an intro bio course. This lesson would include two thirty-minute workshops taught by the Instructional Designer/Research Librarian/Digital Learning expert throughout the course of the project:

• Basics of Copyright and Creative Commons Licensing

• Basics of Video Editing using Adobe Premiere Pro

I typically design self-graded assignments, so I've done that here as well. For rigorous higher ed especially, I feel like students should understand exactly what skills earn what grade and decide for themselves which metrics they feel are important to them. If they plan on pass/failing a class, for example, they might choose to aim for a C rather than an A and feel satisfied with that. It encourages students to take ownership of their education, as does having students license their work. Pluses are assigned if a student exceeds some of the expectations of a certain letter grade; minuses are assigned if a student attempts but does not succeed at all of the expectations of a letter grade.

Assignment: Using open source video and images and/or materials you develop yourself, create a one- to two-minute video on the growth stages of a local plant or animal.

Objectives:

• Research and identify the growth stages of a plant or animal

• Gather open source images and video of the subject you are studying

• Develop your video editing skills by integrating video footage, images, and audio into a cohesive unit describing your subject

For an A:

• All information is accurate and sources are of high quality and reliability

• All stages of growth are displayed in the video

• All sources are cited and incorporated smoothly into the video and in the summary section below the video

• Video includes still images, video, and audio, licensed under Creative Commons or the Public Domain, or taken by the student

• Student has licensed the video carefully and thoughtfully (ie considering the licensing of the images and video included

• Video includes annotations and smooth transitions and has clearly been planned out/storyboarded

B:

• Most information is accurate and sources are of high or decent quality and reliability

• All stages of growth are displayed in the video

• All sources are cited in the video and in the summary section below the video

• Video includes still images, video, and audio, licensed under Creative Commons or the Public Domain, or taken by the student 

• Student has made an attempt at storyboarding

• Student has licensed the video

C:

• Some information is accurate and sources are of decent quality and reliability

• Most or all stages of growth are displayed in the video

• All sources are cited in the summary section below the video

• Video includes audio and still images and/ore video, mostly licensed under Creative Commons or the Public Domain

• Student has licensed the video

D:

• Some information is accurate/sources are of mediocre quality and reliability

• Not all stages of growth are displayed in the video

• All sources are cited in the summary section below the video

• Video includes audio and still images and/or video, not/not all licensed under Creative Commons or the Public Domain

• Video does not have a listed license

F:

• Very little information is accurate; sources are of poor quality or are uncited

• Materials are not licensed under Creative Commons or the Public Domain

• Video does not include all stages of growth

• Sources are not cited and video is not licensed