Much of what I teach in a drama class is focused on narrative. Either construction or de-construction of the narrative plays a central part in my day to day instruction. Of course, this is because I teach drama and the focus is on story and the techniques involved with telling the right story, the right way. I love story and I love teaching students how to break apart its pieces, figure out how it works and put it back together. There is pure joy found in the minutia.
Teaching narrative film is another beast entirely. I think the most perplexing part is the introduction of technology. While a lot of the preliminary work involved does flow chronologically, and therefor logically, once production commences, technology seems to take the forefront and all flow seems to disappear. Ok, perhaps I am being slightly melodramatic, but the references to hair twirling as of late have got me second guessing a lot lately. I think the point is to try to find continuity mixed in with all the technology. And that is when narrative film starts to take place.
Perhaps it is easier in an ongoing film class, particularly in college, to teach these things, but as I begin to finalize and test out my lesson plans, I find that multiple days of instruction are necessary to really help students understand composition, continuity, and narrative. Just a simple cursory overview will in no way be substantial enough to assess that they understand it all. Further, they need hands on participation and application in pre-planning, filming, and editing in order to really give them any sort of a background. They need to actually do it themselves to understand and do it several times.
So, my initial thoughts are these: that it takes careful planning and substantial time and resources to really teach these principals. But if all we can initially do is get them to think more thoroughly about the films they watch and contemplate their construction, then at least we are giving them a foundation for real assessment and reflection on the media they so readily consume.
This is definitely the trend that I saw come up in class last week, and I don't know if I have an easy answer for it. What I think is important however, is the fact that you are beginning to ask questions and are thinking of solutions to the things that you want to do. One of my hopes for the class is if you were given the opportunity to buy equipment or otherwise expand the role of video production, that you would be able identify those tools that would be most effective in helping you meet your goals.
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