Stories of the American Experience

Students at Century High School in Bismarck, North Dakota interview veterans in their community and retell their American experiences. This project empowers students to study, record, and bring history to life, making a solid connection between living history and communication skills. It also offers a way to bridge the generation gap and provides a service to the community.

The class studies storytelling methods and journalistic feature writing, watching news stories and analyzing what makes a good story. Students examine the information available from the Veterans History Project. (See “Tools and Resources.”) Working in small groups, they identify a veteran to interview. This could be a family member of one of the students or someone contacted through an organization in the community, such as a veterans’ service office or the VFW. Students research the topic of the interview using the Internet and books and prepare questions. They contact the veteran and set up a time for the interview. They ask the veteran to share photos from their past experience. Next, students conduct the interview, using a digital video camera to film the veteran. They prepare a transcript of the interview to help them produce a script for their movie.

Students identify one quote from their interview that sums up the veteran’s experience and find a theme for their story. They also conduct any additional research needed to complete their story. Students then use a storyboard to plan their movie, including the script, video clips, and audio to be used. They locate any music they want to use and import it into an iTunes library. They can also locate and download additional photos from the Internet or scan them from books and import them into an iPhoto album. Students then produce a three- to five-minute iMovie project, importing video clips, recording narration, adding images and music, titles, transitions, and effects. All class movies are saved in iDVD and placed on one DVD or recorded to one videotape to produce a full-length documentary. The documentary is shown in a premiere that includes the students’ families, the veterans, and other members of the community. Copies of the movie can also be given to local veterans’ groups or other local organizations or can be shown on the local community-access television station.

After completing this project, students will be able to:

• See how history comes to life by conducting an oral interview.
• Have a greater understanding of an older generation.
• Better understand our nation’s history and the wars that took place and how they affected the people who fought in them.
• Contribute to the community and veterans by recording their history.
• Produce a professional-quality movie.
• Work collaboratively on a project that reaches students who learn in different ways and who have different talents.

After completing this project, students will be able to:

• Effectively use a digital video camera and its accessories to film an interview.
• Use a word-processing application to create a transcript and storyboard.
• Locate and save information and images from the Internet.
• Capture images using a scanner.
• Import photos into iPhoto and music into iTunes.
• Use iMovie to import and edit video clips and produced a finished movie.

Evaluation of the student work can be divided into several areas: quality of the interview (camera work and information gathered), accuracy of transcription, completion of the writing process, quality of the story, completion of the storyboard, quality of editing, overall effect, teamwork, and self-assessment.

Internet

• Veterans History Project

Tools

Macintosh computers (computer with SuperDrive is optional), digital video camera, cordless microphone, tripod, scanner (optional), printer, projector (for premiere), iMovie, iPhoto, iTunes, iDVD (optional), AppleWorks