In their essay, "The 'digital native' debate," Bennett, Maton and Kervin deflate the myth that current undergraduates are distinctly proficient with digital technologies and possess a sophisticated knowledge of how to use information technologies. They describe a much more complex reality that suggests that students consume a lot of digital content but produce very little multimedia. Although their essay is not a call for educational reform, many others suggest that digital literacy needs to be woven into traditional coursework so that students gain meaningful practice in developing skills that combine critical thinking skills with new media techniques. To that end, we designed two group video assignments in two different intermediate writing courses at the University of Minnesota --Twin Cities. Our goal was to introduce an assignment that would engage students but would not sidetrack them from the writing objectives of the course. To be sustainable, the student-generated media assignments needed to be interwoven into the course without transforming the class into a hands-on media production lab. We developed surveys to measure confidence and attitudes and administered them before and after the video assignments.
In Writing 3381, Writing and Modern Cultural Movements, students consider how writing contributes to and constitutes change in cultural movements. Among their assignments, they are asked to write a cultural manifesto, paying attention to the written language conventions that comprise the form. In the second stage to the assignment, students were asked to create short, 2-3 minute videos, translating their written language into a visual format. We called these student-produced videos, "digital manifestos." The objective was to help students update the form and to examine the written form more closely by refracting it through a visual lens. The final stage of the assignment asked students to reflect upon the translation process and to detail what they learned about the manifesto in the processes of composing a written and visual version of the form. Students also engaged in peer review of the manifestos using VideoANT, a video annotation system designed to embed feedback alongside videostreams. At the end of the course, students were expected to show their revised video to the entire class.
In a second course taught by the same instructor, Writing 3151, Writing About Land and the Environment, students examine how writing is used to reflect on, preserve, and change the land and environment. As in Writing 3381, students were asked to compose a short essay, accompanied by a group video. The objectives were largely the same with the goal of updating "nature writing," variously conceived. Once again, students were asked in a final stage of the assignment to reflect upon the relationship between the video and the written assignment and to make evident the mutual influences of writing and visual composition.
In both courses, very little in-class support was devoted to technical concerns related to recording, editing, and displaying video, though students were pointed to several online tutorials. They were allowed to use any camera and editing software they chose, and 10 Flip video cameras were made available for each class. The emphasis was decidedly not on technical video competencies but on the design of effective written work that was influenced by multimedia design.
Selected findings of the study
-Using a factor analysis of five items in a validated and reliable measure, students reported statistically significant gains in their confidence in producing video despite minimal attention devoted to enhancing these specific multimedia production skills.
-Regarding their writing, students strongly agreed that they had a better understanding of the written form of the manifesto because of the video project. They also agreed that making videos helped them learn more in the course.
-When directly asked how the video project influenced them, students consistently volunteered that the projects helped them to "think visually." Students also repeatedly mentioned that the peer review application helped them deliver situated feedback by easily pairing the video timeline with an annotation stream.
Discussion and Future Directions
Our current findings have shown us that with little technical overhead, we can improve student confidence in video production, help students reflect upon written texts in new ways, and focus a writer's attention on visual detail. In future iterations of these courses, we hope to examine how a specific lexicon used in video production can be introduced and repurposed for written composition with the learning objective of increasing a writer's attention to specificity and efficiency.
