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Beach Middle School students learn about digital media

Courtesy photo from the Beach Middle School digital media class.

By Lisa Carolin

Seventh and eighth-graders at Beach Middle School are learning about photography and videography and enjoying a creative outlet at the same time in a class called Digital Media.

Projects have included a newscast, a stop-motion animation, and a video for SRSLY’s My Antidrug contest.

Students learn about taking photographs for the first part of the class and then switch their focus to creating videos later in the semester.

“I think the class is important because it gives the students an outlet for their creativity,” said teacher Amy Wagoner, who also teaches sixth-grade science and a sixth-grade skills class. “It teaches them that creating photographs and video is an art form and that editing techniques we apply can enhance their art.”

Wagoner says that the main focus of photography are skills such as composition, perspective, and lighting.

Courtesy photo from the digital media class.

“Some of the favorite assignments for the photography portion of the class are perspective impossible – where students have to create impossible photos using techniques related to perspective,” she said. “The alphabet assignment is another favorite where students have to find letters of the alphabet in their surroundings.”

Students in the Digital Media class also participate in projects like sidewalk chalk, fractured faces, and my new image.

“For the video portion of the class, the students create a How to Video where the students have to create a project that teaches other students how to do something- students have done how to make slime, how to tie your shoe in three seconds and more,” said Wagoner.

For the SRSLY anti-drug contest, five of the class’ videos won prizes.

Wagoner says she particularly enjoys seeing how proud and enthusiastic students are about their work.

Courtesy photo from digital media class.

“I love when they come in and say, ‘Look at this picture!’ I also love how it allows me to get to know the students better and allows me to see how wonderfully creative they all are.”

Wagoner has taught Beach’s Digital Media class for three years, and the class has been offered for more than ten years.

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