Making Connections between
Film and Literacy
Rick Kern
UC Berkeley
Reality
Created Texts
Print and film media
Is ‘media literacy’ a threat
to ‘print literacy’ ?
5 traits of textualization
1) it realigns reality along axes of space and time;
2) it makes an event identifiable as “the same” at each
viewing;
3) it dissociates the meaning of an event from both the
participants’ and the author’s intentions;
4) it extends the importance of the event beyond its
original context;
5) it makes the meaning of the event accessible to
multiple audiences.
Kramsch & Anderson (1999, p. 34)
Mary heard the ice cream man coming.
Mary heard the ice cream man coming.
She remembered the pocket money.
Mary heard the ice cream man coming.
She remembered the pocket money.
She rushed into the house.
Mary heard the ice cream man coming.
She remembered the pocket money.
She rushed into the house.
And locked the door.
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
• Conventions
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
• Conventions
• Cultural knowledge
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
• Conventions
• Cultural knowledge
• Problem solving
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
• Conventions
• Cultural knowledge
• Problem solving
• Reflection and selfreflection
Seven Principles
Literacy involves:
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
• Conventions
• Cultural knowledge
• Problem solving
• Reflection and self-reflection
• Language use
Content
Elements to be taught…
• Language
• Conventions
• Cultural knowledge
Processes
in conjunction with the
processes of…
• Interpretation
• Collaboration
• Problem solving
• Reflection
Curricular Components
Situated Practice
Overt Instruction
Critical Framing
Transformed Practice
Situated
practice
Overt
instruction
Critical
framing
(√)
(√)
Freewriting
√
Directed Viewing/Reading
√
Letter writing
√
(√)
Journal writing
√
(√)
Creative writing
√
Readers Theater
√
Transformed
practice
(√)
(√)
(√)
√
Situated
practice
Overt
instruction
Critical
framing
Transformed
practice
√
√
(√)
(√)
Mapping
(√)
√
(√)
Revising and editing
(√)
√
(√)
Textual Comparisons
√
√
√
Teaching genres
√
(√)
(√)
Use of models
√
(√)
(√)
Focusing on relationships
Critical Focus Questions
Situated
practice
Overt
instruction
Critical
framing
Transformed
practice
(√)
(√)
√
(√)
Précis
√
Shifting contextual
√
parameters
Summary Writing
(√)
√
√
√
Situated
practice
Overt
instruction
Critical
framing
Transformed
practice
(√)
√
(√)
√
Translation
(√)
Dialogic Transformations
(√)
Stylistic reformulation
(√)
(√)
√
Genre reformulation
(√)
(√)
√
Inventing story
(√)
(√)
√
(√)
√
(√)
continuations
Writing for speaking
(√)
(√)
Matrix exploring magical realism
Plausible Event
Implausible Result
Tita “already crying as she “Nacha swept the residue of
emerged” at birth. (6)
tears… enough salt to fill a
ten pound sack….” (6)
“To make the cake for
Pedro and Rosaura’s
wedding, Tita and
Nacha…” (25)
Rosaura eats the cake and
leaves, “swept away by a
raging rotting river” of other
people’s vomit (40)
Swaffar & Arens (2005)
Matrix exploring cultural patterns
Social Power Exercised
Resistance Undertaken
Mamá Elena: “You being the
youngest daughter means
you have to take care of me
until the day I die.” (10)
Tita wanted to know “who
started this family tradition? …
What happens to women who
can’t have children?” (11)
“The wedding guests were not “She was not meant for the
performing a social act, they
loser’s role. She would put on a
wanted to observe her
triumphant expression.” (37)
suffering….” (36)
“With a look, Mamá Elena
sent Tita away to get rid of
[Pedro’s] roses.” (48)
“It was as if a strange
alchemical process had
dissolved her entire being in the
rose petal sauce. That was the
way she entered Pedro’s
body….” (52)
Swaffar & Arens (2005)
Invitation
Galloping from far Asia
And jutting out into the Mediterranean
Like a mare’s head
This country is ours.
Wrists in blood, teeth clenched,
Feet bare
And this soil spreading like a silk carpet.
This hell, this paradise is ours.
Let the doors close on forced labor,
Never to open again.
Annihilate man’s servitude (enslavement) to man
This invitation is ours.
To live like a tree alone and free
And brotherly like the trees of a forest,
This yearning is ours.
—Nazım Hikmet
Hermann was extremely distressed that whole day. Dining at a
secluded tavern, he drank too much, which was not his wont, in
the hope of calming his inner agitation. But the wine only further
inflamed his imagination. Returning home, he threw himself on his
bed fully clothed, and fell into a deep sleep.
It was night when he woke up; the moon was shining into his
room…
Just then somebody looked in from the street through the
window, and immediately went away. A minute later he could hear
the door of the anteroom open. His orderly, thought Hermann,
was returning from a nocturnal outing, drunk as usual. But he
heard unfamiliar steps: somebody was softly shuffling along in
slippers. The door opened, and a woman in a white dress came in.
Hermann took he for his old nurse and wondered what could have
brought her here at this time of night. But the woman in white
glided across the room and suddenly appeared right before him:
Hermann recognized the Countess in her!
“The ace has won!” said Hermann and turn his card face
up.
“Your lady has been murdered,” said Chekalinskiii affably.
Hermann shuddered: indeed, instead of an ace, the
queen of spades lay before him. He could not fathom how
he could possibly have pulled the wrong card.
Suddenly, it seemed to him that the queen of spades
had screwed up her eyes and grinned. An extraordinary
likeness struck him…
“The old woman!” he cried out in terror.
Hands-On Workshop
Le Ballon Rouge
Como agua para chocolate (Codornices en pétalos de rosa)
Etre et avoir
Super size me
9 literacy-based project ideas (.pdf handout)
Como agua para chocolate
Super Size Me (2004)
Literacy-based project ideas