Green Ambassadors


	Index Introduction Becoming a Sustainability Expert California Science Standards California ELA Standards How to Be a Green Ambassador Unit: Creating an Earth+ Photo Story Unit: Delivering an Earth+ Presentation Unit: Creating and Delivering an Earth+ Presentation Unit: Writing an Earth+ Script Unit: Producing an Earth+ Video Documentary Unit: Creating Earth+ Marketing Materials Unit: Producing an Earth+ Event Unit: Earth+ Social Marketing Unit: Producing an Earth+ Fundraiser Unit: Earth+ Public Relations Training Unit: Planning and Delivering an Earth+ Elementary Lesson Unit: Creating an Earth+ Game Unit: Creating Earth+ Alternative Marketing

Teaching Guide: Writing an Earth+ Script
Guiding Question(s)	*How can the medium of film/video be used most powerfully to engage, inspire and teach people about sustainability issues and solutions?*
Objectives: Language Arts	Standard NL-ENG.K-12.5 COMMUNICATION STRATEGIES Students employ a wide range of strategies as they write and use different writing process elements appropriately to communicate with different audiences for a variety of purposes. Concepts Script Voice-Over Storyboard Skills TBD
Objectives: Values	Students believe that they have a responsibility to contribute to the well-being of their community. Students work to gather and share knowledge that supports the well-being of their community. Students encourage other community members to engage in practices that contribute to the well-being of their community.
Assessment	In the performance task for this lesson, students work in teams to write Earth+ scripts, then present their scripts to reviewers who are in the role of individuals who might be interested in financing the production of the script. (In a school setting, these could be reviewers who will decide which student scripts will actually be produced.) (View Performance Task here)
Day One
Preparation	Select an example of an short video that effectively presents an issue and solution, from those listed on the Green Ambassadors Web Resources page (here), and set up your computer and projector to present it. Identify any resources that you would like to use for teaching students about writing scripts in addition to those provided here, from those listed on the Green Ambassadors Web Resources page (here), and work out how you will incorporate these. Make enough copies of the Checklist for an Effective Earth+ Script & Story Board for each student. (Download here)
Into	Orient students to the objectives of this lesson and review with the the main elements of the Performance Task. Show students the video you've selected. Discuss: What did you think was effective about the video you just saw?
Through	Discuss some responses to the prompt, then ask students to work in groups to respond in writing to this prompt: Write down the qualities of effective and ineffective short documentary videos, in a two-column list format. Share out the responses, making a master list on the board. Make sure that students understand what a script is (a description of the intended content of a video, film or play) , and discuss this question: Why do you think having a good script is important to producing an effective video? Guide a class discussion of this question: What are the qualities of a good documentary video script? List answers. Distribute to each student the handout, Checklist for an Effective Earth+ Script & Story Board and review it. As a class, decide whether not you will add items from your own discussion. If you do add items, have students write those in on their own checklists. Tell them to save their checklists for use later in this unit.
Beyond	Ask students to go through the checklist and choose the 3 items they feel are most important, and to explain, in writing, why they think so.
Days Two and Three
Preparation	Make enough copies of the handout Earth+ Marketing Worksheet for each pair of students. (Download here) Make enough copies of the handout Types of Documentary Scripts for each team of students. (Download here) Make enough copies of the handout Documentary Voice-Over for each team of students. (Download here) Make enough copies of the handout Earth+ Video Story Board for each team of students. (Download here)
Into	Discuss student responses to the "beyond" assignment from last class; collect their work if you wish. Have students respond to this prompt individually, in writing: What message do we want to deliver to our audience about recycling?
Through	Tell students that their goal today is for each team to develop a script and story board for a short documentary video presentation on recycling (you may wish to pick some topic other than recycling, but it should be an issue and a solution that your students know a lot about). Explain that the first task of a documentary video producer is to thoroughly understand the topic of the video through extensive research, but in this case you have deliberately chosen a topic that they are already experts on, so that you will not have to spend a lot of time on this step. Ask students to work in groups for 5 minutes on this task: List 5 facts or principles related to recycling (or whatever topic you've chosen) that you believe would be most important to include in the documentary. As a class, list all of these ideas and through discussion select ten of them. Tell students their next task is to work out what main message they want their video to communicate. Have students work in pairs to fill out the Earth+ Marketing Worksheet for a recycling video, then compare their worksheets in their working groups so as to produce one worksheet per group. Share out some of this work. Tell students that their next task is to make a list of what they would want to include in the video--what do they want to show the viewer, and what do they want the viewer to hear (or read), either through interviews or narration. Give groups 15 minutes to make these lists. Explain that the next task is to write a script. Distribute the handout Types of Documentary Scripts and read through it with students. Do this also with the handout Documentary Voice-Overs. Ensure through discussion that students understand that they have choices in these matters, and the implications of making those choices. Tell students that for the purpose of learning how to make documentaries, in this case you want them to work in their teams to create detailed scripts for their videos, with narration. Then have them work together to do this. Circulate as they work to keep them on task and help them to quickly resolve questions that come up about their scripts; do not let teams get hung up on contents of these scripts as this is just a practice step and they will soon have an opportunity to write a real script and discuss it as much as they wish. As each team complete writing a script, give the team a copy of the handout Earth+ Video Story Board, and have the team create a story board for its documentary (story boards are a way to communicate a clearer idea of the essential content of each separate scene of a documentary film). Have teams share their story boards with each other or with the class as a whole.
Beyond	Students complete the Performance Task for this lesson.