International Review of Educational Cinematography (Jan-Dec 1934)

SOUND AND TALKING FILM 21 ground, age and educational achievment. Nine teachers were provided who had no other teaching duties during the experiment. S-'x units of instruction were used as the basis of the experiment, three in science and three in music. The sound pictures were based upon the subject matter of the units. Each subject was taught for five days, and for thirty minutes each day. The esperimental groups only were given the aid of the sound picture ; the other groups took the same lessons using other didactic aids. The question to be settled was : if it is possible through using the sound picture to obtain the same didactic results with a class of 150 pupils as with a class of 40} The experiment was not directed so much to establish the value of the sound picture itself, as to see if the talking and sound film would allow of the number of the pupils being increased without detriment to the instruction. If it became possible to establish as a result of the experiment that the groups of 150 which utilized the sound film obtained the same result as the groups of 40 without the film, the obvious conclusion could be drawn that the introduction of the sound picture permitted the number of pupils to be increased. The results of the experiment, as taken from the registers of the teachers of the groups, were as follows. The average of the initial points of the three sectors was as follows : Experimental Groups 45.0 Large Control Groups 43.3 Small Control Groups 45.8 Average of final points : Experimental Groups 89.4 Large Control Groups 82.7 Small Control Groups 88.2 Final average on principal points : Experimental Groups 44.4 Large Control Groups 38.9 Small Control Groups 42.4 The result is clear. The experimental group showed an advantage not only over the control groups, but also over groups which had a much smaller number of pupils. The deduction may be made : that sound films can be considered as a real and valuable factor for increasing the number of pupils in any class, and are therefore capable of. providing a solution to a difficult methodological problem. WILL SOUND PICTURES REMAKE THE CURRICULUM P From the report by Mr. Paul Mort, Professor of Fducation at Columbia University. Mr Paul R. MORT, of Teachers' College, Columbia University points out that one of the most notable phenomena of our time is the development in the use of sound and talking films, not only in the mere educational field but also in the school. Some of the areas in which a simplified and more inclusive medium of communication may have great significance are : (1) the carrying out of the educational process prior to the attainment of the facility to read ; (2) the postponment of learning to read until interest and maturity make the process a relatively simple and efficient one ; (3) the education of individuals who have not the capacity to attain facility in reading ; (4) the placement before individuals of all levels of ability situations en masse which may be used as gross units or symbols in the thought processes needed in the study of problems involving vast patterns of activity ; (5) the demonstration of difficult processes, particularly those involving tempo, size or sound, outside normal limits of the senses. Certain consequences have derived from the foregoing which deserve special consideration. In kindergarten and primary schools it has been proved that after the first six years the child was not able to extend the limits of his possibilities of learning, and that the circle of his environment was too restricted for his intuition and understanding. It became necessary then to offer something different. To give him adequate concepts, we must bring him into contact with things which fall without his range of natural vision. A child can learn to read and correctly understand a group of things, phenomena or facts in a period of say six to nine years, but if with the use of the sound picture this period can be reduced to the half or a third, the gain to child, teacher and the didactic system is obvious. It is true that there have been various types of