Friday, November 30, 2007

Filming Animation OR Why My Students Have Issues

So - I'm sitting in a hotel room in Downtown San Diego at the NCSS conference (which has been interesting) and it's rained all day. Riding the trolley has given me time to reflect on this past week and provide you with what I'm sure will be a returning feature - Why My Students Have Issues. I've kept track of many things I've learned about Geography from my students and a couple of my colleagues and I have formed the "Curtain Club" where we share the interesting things our students say and do. The name comes from an assignment I gave in which a student kept refering to a curtain group (we determined it was supposed to be a certain group, but the name stuck). This week's curtain group tidbit:

We were talking about Latin American and the Andes Mountains in Geography. I try to relate things to what my students might have seen so I asked my students what Animated Disney movie takes place in the Andes Mountains (the answer: The Emperor's New Groove - Go Llamas!) and one of my students asked if The Lion King was filmed in Arizona. Yes - it's new and cool - filming your animated film live on a set in another state. Watch out for those animated actors they have major demands! The student still doesn't believe that animated movies are not "filmed" live. The worst part was that it took about 20 minutes for students to make the connection that animated films are not shot live and therefore would not need to be shot in Arizona or in the Andes Mountains.

Mel

Thursday, November 29, 2007


Well - Amy finally got me set up on the account and now I can blog on our blog. She never posted the pictures from crazy hair day - so I'll do that now. It was fun, but my head hurt that night!