Informational video storytelling for children by children: exploring new directions in learning and making media in the classroom

This research makes a case for the importance of children-specific non-fiction media content in a digital age. Drawing from my professional experience making children’s television, I piloted a media education and video production curriculum with a grade eight class at an independent, all-girls school in Toronto, Canada. This paper contextualizes my research by outlining the informing framework of participatory culture and several related concepts which intersect media studies, children’s culture, and pedagogy; it also presents my reflections on creating and testing the curriculum. To both complement my creative research-as-practice and participatory action research approach and chronicle the research project, I created a website (http://betweenproductions.wixsite.com/comcult). It features curriculum materials and research documents, including samples of the students’ work and their reflections; I also produced a short video that incorporates a mix of student and researcher video footage to illustrate one group’s experience creating their final project.