The Educational screen (c1922-c1956])

February, 1947 Page 85 film on the try-square with participation exercises in it ; we have made three separate fihns, each one designed to teach a specific thing. The fact that these three short fihns are i)hysically tied together on the same reel does not necessarily make of them a film with continuity and effectiveness from beginning to end. Such ])rocedure in building participation into the teaching film may apply in certain specialized instances, particularly in the skills film, but it is difficult to imagine it being applied usefully and economically to films designed to impart information or to mould attitudes. This is not to say that under certain recognized conditions interruption of the film may serve learning to good advantage. It may well do .so, but it is a special condition not generally obtaining to the teaching film as a motion picture form, and one which cannot be applied arbitrarily to all teaching films. There is a form of paticipation that should be in every teaching film. It is intellectual participation. It is a qualitv or factor which compels the observer to think as the film progresses, a quality which encourages him to go through a predetermined pattern of mental exercises as he watches the film. It is the same quality which the classroom teacher strives constantly to put into every teaching situation. Intellectual partici])ation in a teaching film is such an elusive quality that it is difficult to describe it, and it is no less difficult to be certain ahead of time that one has .succeeded in putting it into the film. It involves the use of both screen and sound track to encourage and stimulate the mental processes of the audience. It is accomplished by the use of questions and challenges, especially put into the film to encourage the observer to participate intellectually and to make the film an active rather than a passive learning experience for him. P>uilding intellectual participation into the film involves much more than the insertion of interrogatory sentences at scattered points throughout the film; it involves the interweaving of questions and challenges so that they produce a trend of thought whrch we want the student to follow : it involves the phrasing of narration so that he unconsciously accepts it as his own flow of thought; its ultimate effect is to make him a mental participant in the screen action. Building intellectual participation into the teaching film is not as new as it may appear. If we look back upon the teaching films which we have rated as excellent A Valued Past fConclucfed from page 801 and finally VISUAL EDUCATION, becoming the only magazine i n the field. His faifh in fhe fundamental soundness of visual education as a teaching tool remained unshaken through years which sometimes seemed dark for the cause of visual aids. Nelson L. Greene served as a board member for various organizations in the visual field. He was president of the Department of Visual Instruction (DVI) of the National Education Association, 1935-37, and Executive Committee in the past, the chances are very great that we will recognize that we rated themtWjus because they had this quality of intellectual ]mrticipdtiqVi in them, even though we did not identify it at that precise moment. Intellectual participation is mandatory in any good teaching procedure, whether via lecture, book, demonstration, experimentation, or motion picture. It is a quality of teaching and learning which insures achievement on the part of the learner. Any other form of participation, save that of emotional and intellectual participation, tends to make of the motion picture an entirely different form from that in which it produces its greatest effect upon the observer. To expect, for example, the observer to pick up the flow of thought in a film after it has been broken for group or individual activitv, is to expect the impossible of him. Such interruptions, instead of stimulating his mental activity, are more likely to be mental and emotional irritants which will act as serious deterrents to his learning what the film is attempting to teach him. Most, if not all, of the pleas for putting participation into the teaching film have come from a recognition of the undesirable situation which exists when the film becomes a mere passive experience for the observer. The plea for such participation is a recognition of the fact that the film makes its greatest contribution when it becomes an active learning experience. It has been assumed, perhaps unfortunately, that active ])articipation in the film comes about only through physical participation in some form. It should be appreciated that physical activity does not insure that the film will be an active learning experience; on the contrarv. if not u.sed judiciously, it may be the chief factor in defeating that purpose. If the teaching film is to be made a stimulant to the student's learning l^rocesses, then it appears that what we are talking about when we refer to participation is in reality intellectual participation: that what we prefer above all else is to maintain the film intact with all of its unique characteristics, and to imbue it with the added quality of intellectual stimulation which will compel the ob.server to keep his mind alert and working during the time the film is on the screen. If the educational field is to continue its search for better teaching films, as it certainly must, there is no more vitally important problem than that of investigating the design and uses of certain patterns of film construction which lead to intellectual partici]iation on the part of the student. member 1941-45. He delivered many addresses before educational conventions, clubs, and community meetings, both on visual oducotion and on the theatrical "movie". In addition to the vast library of information which he left In past volumes of EDUCATIONAL SCREEN, many of his mI:cellaneous articles appeared in such publications as the BANKER'S MONTHLY, AMERICAN BANKER. ANNALS OF THE ACADEMY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, VISUAL REVIEW. He is survived by Marie Cote Greene, his widow, a daughter, Erminle Greene Huntress, and four brothers: Frank, John, Otto, and Stanley.