L EONARDO

I interviewed Leonardo separately at the end of the project because he had missed the final session in which I had made some recordings of the children responding to prompt cards about their Clip Club experience.

Audio available at: https://soundcloud.com/shelleuk/leonardo-july-2014/s-ZeYgI#t=2:30 [Accessed 21 September 2015]

Leonardo: Well, the most surprising thing was when we… when we got to use the… when we… what… it's actually the film because you get to use all of each other's talents kind of, really, and make them interfused; connect them together to make one movie, or film, yeah.

Michelle: Really good, yeah. So what do you think your talent is; your particular talent?

Leonardo: Making people laugh because in the… when the school saw, it everyone was laughing --

Michelle: Mm.

Leonardo: yeah and especially in the blooper .. “bald head” [laughs at private joke] --

Michelle: [Laughs] yeah. Yeah, how do you think the screening … was that a good thing for you?

Leonardo: Yeah.

Michelle: Yeah. Yeah. It's quite nice to hear everybody laugh. Okay.

Any more?

Leonardo: Yeah, I like it when people laugh because like… like when they laugh --

Michelle: Mm.

Leonardo: -- the people who make it will appreciate it, because they've done something or changed… made change.

Michelle: Mm, what do you mean by that? That's quite an interesting thought.

Leonardo: By change, I mean like change their… say you watch a scary movie like they ... change, you know, when… after you finish, it might have been too scary that you change how you think and you become paranoid about it.

https://soundcloud.com/shelleuk/leonardo-july-2014/s-ZeYgI#t=5:22 [Accessed 21 September 2015]

Leonardo: Well, I kept coming back to Clip Club because it’s fun and you get to like take burdens off you from the day, like especially in the … at the end of Year 6, there's SATS and tests and more tests and even more tests, and (sighs) it was…

it made us stressed out and after we could just relax and make films and stuff, yeah…

https://soundcloud.com/shelleuk/leonardo-july-2014/s-ZeYgI#t=7:42 [Accessed 21 September 2015]

Leonardo: What does that say?

Michelle: [reading from card]’Things that I have found out about myself whilst doing Clip Club’.

Leonardo: What I found out about myself is that I achieved something and no one has said, "Do it". I've taken out one hour every Tuesday, once a week, to do something which is what I can use in later life, if I become a film-maker or anything in that department.

(Interview with Leonardo, 2014)

Co-composition and display

Leonardo had a developed sense of social awareness and seemed to appreciate the range of ability on offer in the group. This was odd considering he was on occasion socially awkward and disconnected from the rest of the children, apart from Nimbus.

Nevertheless, his idea of blending their talents – of ‘interfusing’ them – is a sensitive observation, reminiscent of the ecotonal metaphor discussed in Chapter II, and of the ways in which an environment that welcomes difference can give rise to a potent heterogeneity of expression. Arguably one of the drivers of imaginative project work, along with the artistry of the teacher, is precisely the blending of disparate elements to create new and unexpected forms. As has been mentioned, the children learnt to respect personality differences by experimenting with different roles, allowing talents and interests to surface and channel into a collective endeavour.

Beyond the obvious indicator of social well-being, Leonardo makes an insightful comment on the ways in which laughter creates change. Hearing his schoolmates laughing en masse at something they had created, makes a deep impression on him.

He feels proud of himself: proud in a way that is intrinsic, rather than generated by some extrinsic reward. His proud sense of accomplishment is further suggested at the end of the extract where he mentions his independent decision to ‘take an hour’ of his time for his own purposes. Customarily the valuing of time is perceived as an adult preoccupation and not the concern of an eleven year old, whose time is

irrevocably pre-carved in school systems. Furthermore, his qualification of the ways in which he brought about ‘change’ signifies a metacognitive capacity. In that moment of laughter, he realised that his and the Club’s independent efforts had generated an emotional communion with his peers, and to have made his mark in this way was a lasting triumph.

Practitioner insight: ownership and public celebration

As discussed above, from a practitioner’s point of view, the public staging of media and film events is often overlooked in the school context - like some extraneous add-on - perhaps because analogue literacy products or visual art pieces are traditiadd-onally paper-bound, confined to walls, notice boards or static exhibitions. Conversely, as was demonstrated in the Question and Answer sessions after each screening of the Clip Club films, the public screening is the arena where media authorship and craftsmanship are exposed, where ownership is claimed and celebrated, and where genuine dialogue between peers about learning is oxygenated.