Crushing dreams for being realistic?

We all have dreams. A better life. Being thinner, richer. Sometimes material things. Sometimes something else. Hopefully though we all have a way to balance our dreams with the real world and not spend life wallowing in regrets. When I look back at my life I see that many of my dreams never materialized through …

The Studio Assignment

With the studio really up and running, I want to expand the possibilities. Last spring I gave out an abbreviated form of this lesson - which didn't quite work cause of technical issues in the control room. This year advanced students will produce a talk show as the major part of their second quarter grade. …

Stacking the studio show…

Audiences love both novelty and familiarity. They want consistency, but also look forward to change. Here's how to make these opposites work. The consistency/familiarity are the format of the show. Have a recognizable format. Here's mine: One minute bars/ten second countdown (not part of the show/professional requirement) Show open Anchor intros Pledge of Allegiance or …

Basic studio setup…

I will admit I'm blessed with a pretty sweet setup at my high school. The TV studio was actually (somewhat) planned and built for a purpose - to be used to teach broadcasting/multimedia and to produce a daily program. So the configuration works. There's the studio floor and the control room. We have more gear …

Rethinking my position…

We are now officially three weeks into the new school year and I'm looking over the changes I made in how I teach - and rethinking whether I should have done them. Originally I always started students off with Basic Shots - got the cameras into their hands and them out in the field to …

Camera and gear management in the classroom…

This topic befuddled me when I first began teaching. I mean, the idea is to have gear for each kid - where did this sharing notion come from? Well, I'm into my seventh year and I know the drill. Our most precious resource - our children - are in a perpetual state of getting the …

Diving deep for a while…

Obviously I haven't posted in a while...and it's gonna be a while longer before I can resurface to do much. The Basics of Videojournalism, my not-quite-an-epic is sucking up all my time. It is taking shape from a core workbook, pages and pages of notes and comments, onto something clearer and cleaner. In organizing, we …

Split second training…

The studio is officially up and running at Ronald E. McNair High School. What a challenge. All of the gear was bought nearly four three years ago and it took this long to get the class started and enough interested students to open the control room doors and let them get hands-on with the good …