May 5, 2006

Dove Hill Elementary School ‘goes Hollywood’

Students remake classic tales into films and hold premiere

By Michelle Hecht
Staff Writer

Dove Hill Elementary School students experienced their very own movie premiere on May 2 during School Night at the Apple Store in Westfield’s Valley Fair Mall.

Dove Hill Elementary School second grader Nina Nguyen holds her Certificate of Achievement while her "fans" gather around. From left to right, her sisters Amanda and Vanessa, principal Dolores Garcia and sister Susan. Photo by Michelle Hecht

After taking on the roles of scriptwriters, cinematographers, actors and editors for the last two months, they finally had the chance to enjoy their finished films.

A crowd of students, parents, school officials and the public gathered around a huge screen and computers throughout the store to view the work of these budding filmmakers. Each student then received a commemorative T-shirt and Certificate of Achievement.

It is the school’s first movie project and the work of three Dove Hill Elementary teachers.

Sixth grade teacher Jennifer Hazen learned of School Night at the Apple Store through her husband, an Apple employee. Designed to give students the opportunity to showcase work they have created on a Mac, it allows schools to use their stores as theaters.

With the idea of a cross grade project, Hazen approached Dove Hill third grade teachers Susan Friedman and Laurie Bierman, who is currently teaching a combined second and third-grade class. She hoped that the sixth-graders could act as mentors and guides to the younger students.

“My kids practiced with me first,” said Hazen, explaining the initial steps. “I would teach them the skill in class, the software (iMovie) they would be using ... that way when they went to do the movies with the little kids, they would have those skills and it would then be their responsibility to teach the second and third-graders how to do it.”

Hazen previously received technical training through TAG, a voluntary summer program in the district, which instructs teachers in the use of technology.

“It provides teachers with a laptop and a camera with the idea that if you give the teachers the technology, they’ll start playing around with it and they’ll learn how to do this in everyday classroom situations,” said Hazen.

Friedman had taken an iMovie workshop several years prior, while Bierman learned the editing program along with her students.

Seventy students participated, grouped into 12 teams with two sixth graders paired alongside three second and third graders.

“I think it was fun, because I got to work with a lot of people,” said second grader Nina Nguyen.

In her team’s film, “The Wind and the River,” she played a river that bragged it was the fastest and liked to race people.

Using fables as a basis for the films’ storylines, the students often decided to elaborate while scriptwriting.

“We said if you want, you might want to change them and that’s where they had all the fun,” said Friedman.

In one team’s film called “Goldigeek,” three little boys tease a girl named Goldilocks calling her Goldigeek.

In a take on “The Three Little Pigs” called “The Three Little Girls and the Evil Mean Tree,” a tree tries to eat the girls’ houses, including one made out of ice cream, but a lumberjack warns the tree to leave the girls alone.

“It was very, very silly,” said Friedman, adding that the teachers did not have any say on the scripts or how they acted them out.

“I was amazingly proud, because the kids did it all,” said Dove Hill Elementary Principal Dolores Garcia, who attended the premiere. “They came up with the ideas, they gathered costumes and props, and they just ran with it.”

One young scriptwriter, sixth grader Katheryn Calio, decided to add a twist to “Cinderella.” In her team’s film, “The Phone Cinderella,” in which she also stars, Cinderella loses her cell phone instead of a glass slipper. The prince discovers the cell phone, dials it and finds his love.

Calio enjoyed the filmmaking process, except for all the takes.

“It was hard,” said Calio. “Sometimes you have to re-shoot, because something went wrong or someone said a line wrong.”

However, she looks forward to doing it again, just like her classmate Katherine Nguyen, who wants to be a screenwriter when she’s older.

“I’m trying to continue the empire of “Star Wars,” said Nguyen, who played a bear in her group’s take of “Goldilocks and the Three Bears.”

“I changed it a little at the end ... and said ‘I am your mother,’” she added.

Once the students completed their scripts, they used video cameras and edited on laptops the school previously bought through grants.

“For a lot of the kids, it was their first experience on the computers and video cameras,” said Friedman. “It was amazing. I was trying to show them how to do stuff and they were three steps ahead of me. They just know by osmosis. Same with the program iMovie. They just knew how to do stuff.”

Hazen, Bierman and Friedman note that the parents were enthused to see something different than what they’re used to and to have their children involved in a creative outlet.

“We didn’t know the response would be so overwhelming,” added Garcia. “For this many families to venture out this far (to the premiere), it means a lot to them.”

Since only five of the 12 films were shown, the teachers hope to show the rest at a movie night at their school within the coming months.