TOOLS / ONLINE SEMINARS: Video news in the classroom

The European network “Viducate” will offer another free online course for educators from all sectors. 

"Video News" will give you an introduction of how to bring simple video ideas into your classroom. It will include introduction exercises but also ideas to develop your own news programme together with your group or class. Tutorials will help you to get into basic video production and sharing.

The course will be done on an online platform and everything will be asynchronous. You can choose the timing when you want to work on the tasks. Activities will start at the end of September and will go over a period of roughly six weeks. You will get an electronic certificate if you will have managed to do all main tasks.

Check the Viducate website for course updates and contact Armin Hottmann directly if you are interested in participating in the sessions.

Source - Viducate website

OPPORTUNITIES / CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: The Monteverde new media expedition

A new media expedition?

• expand your media skills
• support restoration of habitats
• support conservation of endangered species
• support the livelihoods of local people
• help extend the Bellbird Biological Corridor into schools and homes worldwide

Costa Rica’s Monteverde cloud forest is one of the most biologically diverse places on our planet. But like wild places around the world, its fragile ecosystems are under enormous stress.

Come join our new media expedition in Costa Rica this July 8th-21^st to expand your new media production skills, while helping to create a sustainable environment for animals, plants, and people.

During a one or two-week program, you’ll work with journalists, educators, artists and travelers who’ll create a multimedia project for local conservation and community groups working on the “Bellbird Biological Corridor”– a project to reforest & re-connect a patchwork of forests, farms and communities from the Monteverde cloud forest down to the Pacific Ocean.

The goal of the expedition is to digitally illustrate the ecosystems and communities in the corridor — through short documentary filmmaking, digital animation & mapping, photos, audio and educational resources –  and make these tools accessible locally and to homes and classrooms worldwide.  By creating networks of learning and support, we will join forces with local communities to protect ecosystems and endangered species, and ultimately, the health of our planet.

APPLY NOW!!!

ONEMINUTESJR / WORKSHOPS: Armenian teenagers share their experiences with juvenile justice in one-minute videos

YEREVAN, Armenia, 9 April 2012 - Sixteen teenagers from different cities in Armenia have come together in the capital Yerevan this week for a five-day video workshop as part of the OneMinutesJr initiative. Their aim is to write, film and produce movies that tell about the experiences they have made when coming in conflict with the law.

The young people are from Gyumri, Alaverdi, Kapan, Ijevan, Vanadzor, Chambarak and Yerevan. Most of them have been arrested by the police in their towns and cities at least once for petty crimes, robbery, stabbing other teenagers with knives or in one case also for alleged rape. Since they are all still minors and their crimes were either not severe enough or could not be proven, they were not sentenced to serve time in prison. Instead, they were all handed over to community centers by the police to receive psychological help and/or do community work.

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NEWS / WORKSHOPS / ONEMINUTESJR / PROJECTS: Young women in India learn to express their views through film

By Anjali Singh

LUCKNOW, India, 14 December 2011 – Nineteen-year-old Laxmi Nishad had wanted for years to talk about the burden of caring for her five family members, including her alcoholic father. Her chance finally came at the OneMinutesJr. workshop organized by UNICEF in Lucknow, India.

Along with 14 of her classmates from Prerna Girls School, Laxmi was given the chance to create a one-minute video about her life, which she titled ‘Me and My Life.’

“My sister was just 11 months old when my mother died, and my father, who drinks all the time, refused to give us any money or even look after us,” says Laxmi. “So it was my responsibility to help the family survive. I was just 13, and I began to work as a housemaid in people’s homes to earn money. But I always yearned for a proper home, and I finally found it at the Prerna Girls School, where I study in now. I wanted to tell people my story and now I did that through the OneMinutesJr. workshop.”

The OneMinutesJr. is an arts-based initiative that teaches young people how to creatively express their views through video. During a five-day workshop, video artists from the One Minutes Foundation help youth participants each create one-minute films.

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OPPORTUNITIES: Film-making Workshops “Who is afraid of the Big Bad Crises?” (BALKAN REGION)

Are you young, creative, curious, willing to meet new people and visit new places? Are you interested in expressing your ideas through innovative film making techniques?

We are looking for you.

Apply now to one of our 3 film-making workshops and you will understand how to overcome your own limits and support others in overcoming theirs. The workshops will aim to address the topical issue of 'crisis' by developing 3 films all starting from the same moment of crisis and structured around the same 'anchor moments'.

During the workshops the selected young filmmakers will have the opportunity to meet and get to know each other, as well as exchange ideas about cinematography and the role of cinema, in the Balkan region.

The main purpose of the workshops is to give participants time to envision and create short films addressing the subject of 'crisis', seen from different perspectives: economical, political, personal crises, etc.

The moderators and trainers of the workshops will be the artists and filmmakers Effi & Amir: www.effiandamir.net

Each workshop will aim to produce a collective short film, challenging traditional film-making methods and instead of a linear creative process – writing, filming, editing – a new creative process will be developed and the three film-making stages intertwined (editing will take place throughout the process and not only at the end, writing will develop and emerge during filming etc), making the relations between writing, filming and editing much more dynamic.

The collective short films will, of course, be co-productions created by teams of participants of different nationalities and will be shown in a public screening after each workshop, as well as during the 2nd edition of "Balkans beyond Borders" Film Festival, which will take place in Athens in June 2011.

The workshops and festival should act as a meeting platform for young filmmakers from the region, workshop directors, organisers and institutions and offer participants opportunities for other future collaborations.

Schedule and deadline for applications

Skopje Workshop Dates: 30 March – 6 April 2011 – Application deadline: 15th of March 2011

Tirana Workshop Dates: 6 May – 13 May 2011 – Application Deadline: 1st of April 2011

Athens Workshop Dates: 15 June – 22 June 2011– Application deadline: 1st of May 2011

More info here

PROJECTS: Young people see their ideas turned into film (UK)

Around 150 youngsters saw the fruits of their labours at a screening of 20 media project films.

The young people aged from 13 to 25 year-olds from Swindon and all over Wiltshire took up the Mega Media Challenge producing projects in film, animation, graphic design, photography, music and computer games.

Project co-ordinator Sherylee Houssein of Create Studios, Swindon, said: “Mega Media Challenge has been great at developing young people’s skills and ideas into real projects.

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NEWS / OneMinutesJr: Lao teenagers get first taste of video making at OneMinutesJr workshop

Luangprabang, Lao PDR: December, 2010: Fifteen short films – each exactly one minute long – were the outcome of a workshop in this picturesque Lao town that gave a group of Lao teenagers a unique opportunity to try their hand at digital video production.

The workshop was the latest collaboration between the Netherlands-based One MinutesJr Foundation and UNICEF through which – since 2004 -- youth in over 80 countries have had the chance to unleash their creativity onscreen.

Stories about a stranded tuk tuk driver, a gilded puppet, and a young boy dreaming of running his own computer shop were among the finished films. Buddhist monks, a maker of traditional instruments and an animated family portrait also featured in the video productions which drew high praise for their creativity and technique.

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OneMinutesJ workshop in Macedonia 2010

OPPORTUNITIES / TRAINING / WORKSHOPS: Invitation to Funded Workshops in Finland 2011

Teachers, head teachers, teacher trainers, and child, youth and adult educators from EU countries,* Croatia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Turkey and Switzerland, are eligible for Comenius or Gundtvig grants. The funding is available for workshops taking place in Oulu, Finland during 2011 and includes participant travel costs, accommodation (plus breakfast and lunch), and the course fee.

*Please note participants from the host country, Finland, are required to pay their own costs.

The next deadline to apply for workshop funding is 14 January 2011 – funding is for educators in employment and also those who are currently unemployed and seeking employment.

The 5-day workshops run from Monday to Friday and a choice of dates are available between May-October for each of the three themes:
1. Introduction to Film-Making
2. Education for Sustainable Development
3. Digital Tools and Media Literacy

Programme details, application instructions and information about how to apply for funding are available from http://www.psk.fi/in-english/comenius-grundtvig-studies.html

Looking forward to seeing you in Oulu
Ros Cooper - Workshop Facilitator

OneMinutesJr workshop on HIV/AIDS in Ukraine

15 teenagers from different regions in Ukraine have gathered in the UN House in Kyiv this morning to start a five-day project that might change their lives and the attitudes of many other people. They all are directly or indirectly affected by HIV/AIDS and will produce 15 short videos, the OneMinutesJr, over the course of this week.

Yukie Mokuo, the UNICEF Representative in Ukraine, welcomes the participants of the workshop and tells them about a similar workshop held in the Eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk last year, where children of the same age successfully produced a series of videos on children's rights. "The films are so powerful", Mrs Mokuo says, "that we plan to have the films that you create this week shown at a huge international conference on HIV/AIDS in Vienna next month. And we will definitely also use them in November in a national conference on the same topic here in Ukraine."

More motivation comes from the fact that the films will all go live on the project website www.theoneminutesjr.org and that all participants are automatically registered for the annual OneMinutesJr award.

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WORKSHOPS: OneMinutesJr workshop on water issues in Tajikistan

Follow the blog!

Day One - http://www.unicef.org/ceecis/reallives_14455.html
Day Two - http://www.unicef.org/ceecis/reallives_14456.html
Day Three - http://www.unicef.org/ceecis/reallives_14457.html

and two more to go...

AWARDS / OneMinutesJr: Child-rights video contest winner focuses on the right to education

NEW YORK, USA, 20 November 2009 – A young girl in India longs to be in school. She watches through the window and the gracious teacher calls her in. But when she sits down, the boys shift over to one side to be away from her.

VIDEO: Watch now

This is the premise of ‘The Classroom’, the winner of the UNICEF youth video contest marking the 20th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).

As the one-minute video progresses, more and more girls join the first girl’s side, until the classroom is full of both boy and girl students doing their lessons.

Worldwide submissions

Created by Sonu Thakur, 15, of West Bengal, India, the video is a simple yet beautiful way of illustrating Article 28 of the CRC, which states that every child has the right to an education. It also illustrates one of UNICEF’s top priorities – getting more girls in school.

The video contest, which drew over 135 videos from around the world, asked young filmmakers to produce one-minute videos expressing what child rights mean to them. Judges selected 12 finalists, representing India, Colombia, Bangladesh, Canada, Chile, Mexico and Romania.

The finalists were judged by a panel of youth video makers and activists, and adult media professionals.

Besides organizing the contest in connection with the 20th anniversary of the CRC, UNICEF ran ‘OneminutesJr’ workshops in 11 countries under the child-rights theme. Operated in partnership with the One Minutes Foundation and the European Cultural Foundation, the ‘OneminutesJr’ project organizes five-day film workshops in which each participant learns camera skills, story development and production techniques.

The CRC-related workshops resulted in the production of video by young people in Senegal, Bangladesh, South Africa, Kyrgyzstan, Germany, Niger, Ukraine, Barbados, Dominica, British Virgin Islands, Trinidad, Antigua, Guyana, Moldova, Mongolia and Viet Nam.

The videos from these workshops are currently featured on the CRC 20th anniversary website.

OneMinutesJr video workshop in Papua New Guinea - Day 5

The final day of the OneMinutesJr workshop in Port Moresby has arrived. Hard to believe that it has already been five days since we started working with the teenagers here in the YWCA office in "Mosbi" as Port Moresby is called in Pidgin English.

The day has a very simple structure: Get ready before 5 PM! Many of the films still need a voice-over or subtitles. There is music to be chosen, the teenagers sing songs and for one film they even write their very own song in the morning. The computer room has been turned into the "audio studio". It is by far the most quiet room in the building so it is here where we capture the voice-overs with the cameras.

The trainers have almost worked through the night to get the rough edits on the way and now it is all about putting the last touches on the films. Names and titles have to be added, certificates of participation need to be filled in and so time flies by and the big moment of the final presentation comes almost unexpectedly in the afternoon.

The screening of all 15 videos the children produced this week is - as always - quite an event. Their parents have come to watch the films, the YWCA staff is there and UNICEF staff members from different programmes have also come to see what the children came up with.

The result is a stunning display of creativity, but it is also a mirror image of childhood in PNG, which is not always just happiness and joy. A lot of problems remain for young people in the country - violence, neglect, gender problems, etc - and the OneMinutesJr films we produced here should not be seen as remedy but rather a method of showing the symptoms. Getting the right help that is needed is not in the hands of the children in most cases, but when they work together with the adult, there will be ways of improving the lives of the children in PNG.

Port Moresby, PNG - November 20, 2009 - Chris Schuepp

OneMinutesJr video workshop in Papua New Guinea - Day 4

--Two days remain at this exciting OneMinutesJr workshop in Port Moresby. Not "two days" but "two years" is the title of the first film that is completely finished. Paul's film about his two-year prison sentence is filmed, edited and already has its voice-over.

But there are still four participants who have not started with their films and so we are out with the cameras again today. Sindy (16) is first with her film about a girl who does not do what her mother tells her to do. The argument ends with the mother beating the girl and chasing her out of the house. The girl flees to her best friend, but the mother in the end finds her and apologizes.

In the afternoon, we are off to two different settlements on the outskirts of the capital Port Moresby. Ephraim's secondary school is near the first settlements and the little children from around there always exchange empty plastic bottles for biscuits in his school So Ephraim wants to use this opportunity to tell the world more about the lives of these underprivileged children who live in the streets near his school.

Next is Junior (17) and his story about alcohol abuse in his neighborhood. We are out in the streets filming a scene at a local store when more and more people, children and adults, gather to watch the filming. They are all very interested in what is going on, ask questions and make comments and give suggestions. When Paul (17) gives the final "action" sign and Wesley (14) pushes the record button for the last time, there are at least 100 people out to witness the film-making process in Kila Kila village.

Before the sun sets, Louisah (14) is the last participant to finish her film. She has told us that at one point she considered committing suicide because her parents are always fighting. But fortunately she did not go all the way and reconsidered her decision. She is a happier girl now, and with her film she wants to make a stand against teenage suicide and give others new hope.

Port Moresby, PNG - November 19, 2009 - Chris Schuepp

OneMinutesJr video workshop in Papua New Guinea - Day 3

Half-time at the OneMinutesJr workshop in PNG and today is the big filming day. We have planned to get as much as possible done today and would like to finish six films on this sunny Wednesday in Port Moresby.

The first location of the day is a very special one. It is the place where Paul spent the better part of the last two years. The 17-year-old boy was sentenced to two years in prison and served his time in the correctional centre outside Port Moresby.

Today he is back behind bars, but only for the duration of the filming. He wants to create a powerful movie that warns other young people by telling them what the loss of freedom means to a teenager. Paul is still recovering from the time in prison, but he also has a lot of hope and now puts education and a life without violence above everything else. We also found out this week that Paul has a lot of talent behind the camera and that becoming a cameraman might be an option for him in the future.

After the prison, we go to a school. Alythea (13), who has spent some time in the educational system in Australia and who is now back here in PNG, wants to show how crowded the classrooms are in her home country. The final sentence is: "Can you imagine learning in this environment?"

In the afternoon, the whole workshop group drives out to Hanuabada, the biggest village in the country. Hanuabada is partly built on the water and there are fantastic filming locations here, so we immediately set off to film in different places and with different participants. Kaia (14), who actually lives here, wants to show the life in her village in the film. In the meantime, Faith (14) uses Kaia's home for her film, in which an adopted child is exploited by the other family members. And Charlie (16) goes out to the nearby market to film teenagers who smoke.

On the way back to the workshop venue, the YWCA office in Port Moresby, we stop at a grocery store. But not to do the groceries! We are here to shoot the sixth film of the day. Stephen's film is about the fact that he cannot go to school because his family cannot avoid the 40 Kina (about 15 USD) that the bus to school would cost him every month. So he shows us what he could buy for 40 Kina in the supermarket. And tomorrow in the morning we will film him standing at the bus stop, while the bus, of course, will leave without him, because rice and flour and sugar are more important that school. Or maybe not...?

Port Moresby, PNG - November 18, 2009 - Chris Schuepp

OneMinutesJr workshop in Montenegro - Day 5

On the final day of the OneMinutesJr workshop in Budva, Montenegro, work starts in the early morning with the editing of more than 10 films that still need to be finished. Also, despite the "Thursday, 12 noon deadline", two of the participants still need to do their filming. The weather has worsened again and it is windy and rainy, even thunderstorms are expected for today.

At 11 AM we have new hope when the storms calms down for half an hour. Nina (15) gathers the actors for her film about friendship and we race through the Old Town to find different locations for the filming. We are just finished when the rain starts again and we still have to film with Marinko...

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WORKSHOPS: OneMinutesJr workshop in Montenegro - Day 1

Budva, Montenegro - 9.00 AM on a beautiful Monday morning in late autumn. 20 children and teenagers from all over Montenegro have gathered in a workshop room overlooking the Adriatic Sea, ready to start a five-day workshop that will give them new insights into film-making and visual story-telling.

The topic of the workshop is "children' rights" and there could not be a better time for all this, taking into account that this month, the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) turns 20 years old. There will be celebrations and festivities in almost every country of the world, and here in Montenegro, this workshop is part of it.

By the end of the week, the young people will have produced 20 OneMinutesJr videos in which they present their own personal views on the CRC and the way they children's rights in real life.

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PROJECTS: India’s Child Reporters Initiative: a twinkling star in the dark night

ORISSA, India, 18 August 2009 – Four years ago, UNICEF spearheaded an initiative called 'Child Reporters Reporting on Children's Issues' in order to give a voice to the marginalized children of the remote Koraput District.

An innovation in child participation, the outcome was a newsletter aptly called 'Ankurodgama' – which is translated as the sprouting of a seed, the first sign of life.

In their first issue, the children reported on topics close to them such as the lack of safe water, child marriages, challenges in attending school, and food insecurity.

"Before, we had no aspirations except going out to find some jobs after our education was over. But the reporting process has enabled us to understand our village, our community, and livelihood opportunities around us," says Child Reporter Laichan Muduli.

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WORKSHOPS: OneMinutesJr workshop in Moldova - Day 1

The OneMinutesJr workshop crew is on the road again - this time we are spending a week in the small city Străşeni, 20 kilometers west of the Moldovan capital Chisinau.

The venue for this week's workshop is the Străşeni boarding school educational base and home for about 350 children from 1st to 9th grade.

A group of 21 young girls and boys has gathered today in classroom IX-a to start the audio-visual story-telling workshop. By the end of the week they will have written, filmed and edited their personal OneMinutesJr videos, films exactly 60 seconds in duration. All children have different stories to tell, there are different reasons why they are in the boarding school and they all feel differently about being there.

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NEWS / WORKSHOPS / VIDEO: Making movies young - Youth media club screen products of a 10-day film training camp (BHUTAN)

Making movies young - Youth media club screen products of a 10-day film training camp

12 July, 2009 - The videos are shaky and images zoom in and out of focus from time to time but the message is clear.

Youth and Video Games, Buried in Garbage, Teenagers in Love, People and Television and Life of a Taxi Driver were some of the themes of the eight short films made by members of the youth media club that were screened on July 9, coinciding with the Children and Youth Festival in Thimphu.

It was the outcome of a 10-day film training camp, where club members learnt how to use the medium as a means to tell stories that concerned them. Participants, working in teams, came up with their own themes and used flip cameras and computers to gather and edit material. Most of the films ran for ten minutes or less.

According to the Bhutan centre for media and democracy (BCMD), the main objective of making these short films is to foster discussion and debate on issues concerning the community. BCMD believes it will garner discussions on issues related to preserving culture, promotion of democracy and understanding of media as more than just entertainment.

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