Going Back in Time

As a child from the 50’s/60’s, I often remember the educational movies we were shown in school. The classic male voice, so serious with melodramatic background music, flicking and snapping across the film as it rolled through the reel. After the teacher got the projector threaded, lights went out and after 5 minutes I’d be asleep at my desk. Try showing clips from one of these movies from the Prelinger Collection on education to your students as ask them what they think, they might get a kick out of going back in time and seeing what it was like to be a student way back when.

Educational movies from the Prelinger Collection from archive.org.

Here is a good one that you might use as a kick off to 1:1 computing (proper care of the fountain pen) or a writing class when you talk about the many different digital tools available to communicate their ideas and messages... “TRACES DEVELOPMENT OF WRITING & TOOLS OF WRITING. SHOWS VARIOUS PARTS OF A FOUNTAIN PEN & DISCUSSES ITS PROPER CARE & USE.”  It makes me think about how writing has changed over time and what it mean to be literate in a digital world? What skills and dispositions do our students need in today? Are we still teaching reading and writing from the 19th century model?
Here is a copy of the same video on YouTube for quicker viewing...