I had to do a report a couple semesters ago about what movie should be shown in school for educational purposes.
Now, my teacher was clearly a Pixarian… She had a LGM from Toy Story on her whiteboard, and we watched Up one day in class while she was gone. I was established as the school’s resident Pixarian/indie kid/animation geek when we were given “scavanger hunt” worksheets – and I knew were everything was before the movie started.
But I digress. I eventually chose on of my all-time favorite films, Wall-E, to do the report on. My arguments were that beyond the obvious “green-earth” themes (bio class?), there was a more deeper message of morality in the film. That would be perfect for a psych class, and the silent portion puts great emphesis on the characters (art class).
I chose Wall-E to do this report on by no other grounds besides that I truly believe it is a very deep, fun, complex and emmotional film. Does anyone else agree that this film would be extremely useful in schools?
EDIT: I guess someone agrees!
amazon.com/WALL–Classroom-B … 669&sr=8-1
Yeah, there’s the classroom edition.
…Come to think of it, I wonder how good that public exhibition license is? It’d be awesome if I could buy that and be able to show the film at a large church gathering or something.
Anyways, I wish we’d had incentive to show more animation in classes when I was a kid and to use it as a study tool. Incorporating things I love into homework makes it so much easier.
I agree; I think there should be more interesting things implemented to the classroom environment. It’s gotten so depressing, it’s a wonder that kids survive these days in all seriousness.
Don’t forget to mention the religious theme in the movie!
I think it would be a good film to show.
Library Districts, be they County or Free Libraries or some such organizational designation often have some sort of ‘Papal Dispensation’ (license or actually a payment to a bunch of movie studios) to show movies at their Community Room. These events are often during school intercessions, so the schools don’t actually have to do much of anything legal-wise. In fact, the library systems work heavily with the schools to plan the events along with other educational recreations, such as ‘Make Your Own Comic Strip’ and other treats the kids are sure to enjoy. The movie is for the kids, mostly, but since the library is paying for it, anyone can come, including parents, and notices are put up on the library bulletin board and online BB’s too. Widespread advertising is forbidden, such as in newspapers. Projectionist beware: there is usually daylight infiltration, but the sound and projection systems are usually quite good nowadays in such facilities.
To cite just such an instance, I googled certain phrases about Wall-E and got a result 10 miles away. Here is an excerpt from my post about this experience:
“A year after the movie came out I went to a free library screening in their community room. The entire audience was either female or kiddie, it was spring break for their school system. As the movie rolled along you could see the figgetty kids, some preschool, but mostly 6-12 years of age. Most had their mothers nearby. Well, by the time Eve was cocooned nearly a third of the mothers had picked up their babies or kids and left. Then Wall-E started crying out for Eve not to leave on the returned spaceship, and some of the preschoolers chimed in for Eve not to leave. The figgetting stopped. The rest of the movie had the rapt attention of those who remained and they heartily clapped at the end… But most of the preschoolers had been spirited away, the remaining avg age was 10. It was very instructive for me to have been sitting in the last row and observe all these goings on.”
The librarian was really pleased with the movie, as were many of the ‘older’ kids, aged 10-11. There was no discussion afterwords. It wasn’t a classroom or Sunday School venue.
I’d love to do a report on WALL-E. I mean, it has so many themes and intepretations. It’d really go well with an RE class I think.
Last year in Environmental Science we where going to watch it (after our Final exam we had an extra day of class) but it wouldn’t play so we watched Up instead, Wall-e would have been perfect for the class though!!
and on an English project (write a paper or do a poster on a hero for a movie to learn heroic characteristics) I thought of which Pixar character (other than the Incredibles) would be a good Hero, i chose Wall-E, i looked it up online, and got an article from USA Today, much better than Wiki and completely relevant, this is why i love Pixar, the movies are animated, but could easily be taught in school on multiple levels.
I think it’d be an interesting film to watch in Science class.
We watched it once in Agriculture class. Not becaues the teacher assigned it, but because we had free time and a student brought it in.