“I believe in a visual language that should be as strong as the written word.”
David LaChapelle
Writing ability is the ability of a productive student under the macro skills that include listening, reading, and speaking. A creative way to hone proficiency in this written form of communication is to employ a conceptualized contemporary guided writing approach applicable to native or non-native speakers. In this strategy, the exploration of dignified film passages is methodologically processed where the understanding of ideas and the manipulation of grammatical structures and appropriate writing mechanics are processed through images and sequence of actions.
Movies today come in many forms due to the start of technological inventions. As a result, the ideas embedded in the films are numerous and rigorous scrutiny of this information implies a broad understanding of the intensive teachers to choose from and provide valuable details for the active participation of students. Among these, silent films produced by independent film crews thriving on the web today can be a promising springboard that relies predominantly on visualization skills, as learners have to rely on images and action sequences.
In order to offer these instructional operations, there are five imperative guidelines that teachers have to consider in the process. These include selecting suitable authentic material that can be supported by technological tools, reflecting on achievable micro-skills aligned with intended outcomes, formulating comprehension questions for the prior knowledge rewriting task, performing of the final writing task using the images of the films and sequence of actions, and previous transmission of clarified instructions to facilitate the time and prepare the writing commitment of the students.
Writing Guide #1
It provides opportunities for teachers to select appropriate material for writing instruction by considering questions similar to these. Does this lesson reflect the coverage of the English program? Does this film suit the cultural background of my students? Do you answer the formal comprehension questions in the first writing task? Will I be able to build questions according to the basic levels of understanding from their images and sequenced actions? Is it aligned with the writing procedures stipulated in the final writing assignment? Does it have all the elements to be answered? Will I be able to inculcate the grammatical structures that I want to measure? Will this material adequately produce the production of micro-skills in writing? Are the general instructions built in the writing classroom enough? Can this material exhibit the manipulation of technological instructional tools?
Writing Guide No. 2
Contains reflections of the micro-skills to be developed from the silent movie clip. Students are expected to adequately perform the objectives listed within this commitment. Use proper capitalization, spelling, and punctuation. Use the appropriate tenses, genre and case to express ideas. Put the words in the correct order. Write ideas through the appropriate use of vocabularies. Apply subverb agreement. Vividly reconstruct ideas in written form using their own acquired terminologies. Sequence ideas logically. Summarize the idea of the film through acceptable constructed titles. Correctly indent paragraphs and provide favorable answers to comprehension questions.
Writing Guide No. 3
This involves the initial write instructions containing applications of digital instructions. To facilitate time, the teacher gives the URL of the silent short film as homework. Students google the site to be directed to the YouTube movie, Wings. Students preview the two-minute silent film to answer the comprehension questions under guideline #4 to obtain the necessary background information. The written result will serve as the main writing activity. In addition, students review the questions from Guide No. 5, to gather relevant information for deliberation in the classroom to carry out the final writing activity.
Writing Guide No. 4
The following comprehension questions will be used to elicit background information and gain film appreciation as components of the main writing task: What is the title of the short film? How many minutes is the short silent video? Who is the actor in the movie? What is the nationality of the artist? Who directed the movie? When did it occur? Where was it produced? What character is represented in the story? What kind of ending is the story? What symbolism can you see that alludes to the message transmitted? Does this story happen in reality? Justify how it happens in reality. Create a short paragraph from these questions.
Writing Guide No. 5
Narrative Content Writing Instructions are the instructions students must follow in the post-writing activity, such as looking at the images and actions sequencing all events according to how they occur in the film excluding technical elements, using words descriptive sentences to describe the character, using the appropriate tenses to explain all of the character’s ongoing actions, answering the following questions to build a second paragraph: Why was this movie made? What message do you want to signal to public viewers? Does society sanction this type of behavior? What problems does this behavior bring to the lives of individuals and to society as a whole?
Also, provide a conceptual title to summarize the overall thematic thinking and combine responses into short narrative paragraph forms.
The written outputs
When the writing of Guide No.4 is facilitated by the teacher and seriously written by the student, we expect a written production through comprehension questions similar to this example.
at
By Fahad Abdullah Al-Hamshi
The short film is a three minute 12 second video of a young Indian man played by Naresh Bhagavathi and is directed by Vaisakh Anandavally Raveendran which tells the story of a drug addict. This was produced in March 2013, in India. This movie ends with a tragedy. The strong symbolism found here is the dove, or its wings because when people are under the influence of illegal drugs they always think they can fly. This story is happening in our midst today because there are many people who are addicted to drugs which creates problems for the government.
Furthermore, we expect a viably written narrative through moving images and sequenced events similar to this one, when the procedures are practically instructed and properly followed per Writing Guide No.5.
The temporary state of pleasure
By Abdullah Mohamed Al-Harbi
In the early morning of a quiet urban area, a lost young man wakes up with a surprise to discover that he has slept all night on the roof of a tall building. Suddenly his blurry attention catches the very presence of a cooing dove. He tries to chase it away but the bird remains in front of him. He quickly picks up a chunk of concrete and throws it at the unsuspecting bird. Frightened, the creature quickly flies away. He watches him intently walk away. Mesmerized by the movement, a strange idea occurs in his mind. Obviously exhausted, he stares at his trembling right hand as he slowly sets the motion of a flutter. He turns to his left hand which lazily makes a similar motion. Little by little he stands up and continues with the same gestures. He leaps like a winged creature approaching the edge of the skyscraper’s rooftop. He gazes down from his tremendously high distance at the abysmal city street and then gapes at the rising sun. His face shows security and pleasure. Like a bird that quickly spreads its wings and shakes its head ready to fly, he takes a fatal impulse. This film was produced to warn the public about the deadly effects of the use of dangerous drugs that all governments condemn because they destroy human lives and society as a whole.
The realization of these writing activities is based on the knowledge of the language instructed and previously acquired by the students. These writing activities are recommended for advanced learners who possess the ability to transfer ideas through proper word transformations and sentence manipulation. However, in order to properly sequence the ideas, it is important that the teacher use guiding questions for the active participation of the students.
To add, with the use of the guiding questions when coining their content through events and images, students are expected to properly manipulate their visualization skills to renew the visual intelligence of students while using appropriate languages to express their perceptions towards the abstract. ideas
It is noted in writing activity one that students are tasked with carrying out their skills in the comprehension levels of the questions. While the second writing activity strives to answer some micro-skills as mentioned in the reflection guide that they are expected to do, such as proper capitalization, spelling, punctuation, tenses, gender, and word order. , vocabularies and subverb agreement. .
In addition, students are expected to reconstruct ideas viably into written form using their own acquired terminologies, sequence ideas plausibly, summarize the idea of the film through acceptable constructed headings, and indent the paragraph correctly when using the approach. guided writing.