Middle School Designers Consider a classroom with 15 students, including general education students, students with learning disabilities, students with behavior disorders, and a student with a severe physical impairment. Students begin by reading The Wizard of Oz and then watching the classic movie The Wizard of Oz on laserdisc. The teacher spends several class sessions discussing the book and the movie with the class. Students access the laserdisc to find specific scenes in the movie for comparison with passages in the book and then relate information from both sources to their list of story components. Next, the students work in small groups to design multimedia programs based on one of the story components, such as character development.
Students spend several class sessions designing and flowcharting their programs.
They identify the text to be included, the video clips for illustration, and the places for links to supplemental information. Groups that work on character development write descriptions of the characters at key points in the plot. They select quotes from the text and they find video clips that illustrate the character changes. Students spend several class sessions using their plans and flowcharts to create multimedia programs with HyperCard. They are surprisingly articulate about the character development of Dorothy and the Cowardly Lion, plot progression, Dorothy's external conflict with the witch, and Dorothy's internal self-conflict.