Title: Introducing Camera Use Objective: Become familiar with safe operation of digital cameras. Age Range: Preschool to 1st/2nd Grade Time: 20 minutes Materials: One camera with a neck strap for demonstrations, camera shaped viewfinders (one for each child), photo shoot song/chant. Optional: broken/not functional cameras for students to explore. Process: Discussion: Go over the parts of the camera. Depending on the age of the students, cover power button, shutter release, lens, zoom, shutter and aperture. Activity: Pass out camera shaped viewfinders. Have the children practice looking through the viewfinder at objects that are close and far away. Use the following chant to practice stopping to take a photo: To the tune of “We’re going on a bear hunt.” (With view finders hanging around necks) We’re going on a photo shoot. We’re gonna take some pictures. Walk and look (hold hand up to shade eyes and look around while you walk). Stop! Take a picture (stop walking, raise viewfinder to eyes and pretend to take a photo). Tips: When discussing the lens with young children, equate it to the eye. The shutter opens to let light in like our eyelid, then closes very quickly. The aperture gets bigger like our iris to let more light in. Just like you don’t like to get poked in the eye, the camera can be damaged if you touch the lens. Always use a neck strap. A $7 neck strap can save you the cost of replacing a camera. Title: What Do You See? Objective: Practice framing/cropping through still life photography Age Range: Preschool and up Time: at least 15-20 minutes for discussion, 5 minutes or less per student for photography Materials: Camera and tripod, objects to photograph, backdrop (roll paper or cloth), table, examples of still life, such as paintings and advertisements. Optional: lights or reflectors Book Suggestions: Tana Hoban’s Take Another Look and Look Again! (for young children) Process: Discussion: Use “See-Think-Wonder” to discuss the still life examples. Notice what is in the frame, what objects were chosen. Why are those objects in the still life? Talk about advertisements as a form of still life. Demonstrate setting up a grouping of objects. Do you want it to be tall or wide? Depending on the size of your group, create a collaborative arrangement where each child chooses an object and adds it to the display. Set-up: Tape the backdrop to the wall and drape over the table. Set up the camera on the tripod in front of the table. Have the objects to photograph nearby. If using lights, have them plugged in and ready to go. Activity: Each child will arrange some objects on the backdrop, then take a few photos of the arrangement. They should pay attention to what is showing in the viewfinder. Are all of the objects inside the frame? Is the edge of the backdrop showing? Add or subtract objects and take a few more photos. Tips: To speed up the process, while one child is using the camera, have the next child gather objects on a tray for his or her turn. Sometimes choosing objects takes longer than photographing them. Extensions: Use mats or frames to contain an area for children to draw (this works well on the ground outside). Once you are comfortable with the children handling the cameras, have objects from the classroom available for still life as an ongoing activity. Encourage choosing objects from around the classroom to create still life. Title: All Our Pictures Tell a Story Objective: Use landscape and architectural photography with collage as illustrations for a story. Age Range: Preschool and up Time: 1 hour, in 2 sessions Materials: Session 1: Cameras with straps, access to room interiors, building exteriors and/or outdoor areas, photos of landscapes, buildings, street scenes and rooms. Session 2: Printouts of children’s photographs from session 1, paper, pens and scissors or people cut-outs and pens, glue sticks Book Suggestion: Knufflebunnny by Mo Willems Process: Discussion: Read Knufflebunny and/or look at photographs that contain an obvious story. Discuss what the photographer included in the frame to tell the story. For Knufflebunny discuss what the artist added to the photographs to tell the story. Activity: Find an area without people to photograph. Have the children think about the story they’d like to tell and take photos of backgrounds for those stories. Print out photos, then have the children add characters to these backgrounds using paper cut-outs. Tips: Set the cameras to black and white if you plan to print out black and white photos for the children to manipulate. This will allow the children to see the image on the viewfinder as it will appear in print. Turn on the grid feature on the camera screen. This will help students keep the scene level. Extensions: Use the illustrations to create a class book. Continue adding to the book as the year progresses. Create a deck of these photos and have the children figure out where the photographer stood to take each one. Title: Light and Shadow Objective: Explore the use of light and shadow in photography. Age Range: Preschool and up Time: 1 hour Materials: Cameras set to black and white, examples of black and white photography from well-known artists Process: Discussion: Use “See-Think-Wonder” to discuss the black and white photography examples. Notice the light and dark areas, lines and framing. Activity: Each child will take a camera to the play yard (or other familiar area outside) and look for examples of light and shadow to photograph. Tips: This activity is best done on a bright sunny day, before or after noon, when shadows are apparent. Great for an outdoor field trip to a garden. Encourage vertical photographs. Extensions: Printed on transparencies, these photos make interesting window displays.
