A comprehensive guide to anything and everything that could come up in the 2012 AQA GCSE TV Crime Drama exam. This booklet is over 40 pages long and has been made with both students and teachers in mind. It contains facts and information about the genre, activities for students to complete in class and at home, and a variety of visual aids to help prepare for the exam’s design tasks.
A sheet for pupils or teachers explaining exactly what should be analysed and how. The focus on this sheet is for the AQA spec, for assignment 1 audience and media language analysis but can be adapted for many other analysis topics.
1) Genre Posters Worksheet - A table for students to fill in about different film genres, helping them understand codes and conventions of different genres such as action, horror, western, romance etc
2) Posters of Different Genres - A large selection of film posters from different genres all handily in a word document to allow for easy printing. I printed these and then cut them up to seperate them and got students to sort them into genres first as a starter, and then fill in the table as the main task..
A step by step tutorial for students, along with supporting images, to help them get to grips with the popular techniques and conventions used in the design of film posters. I have used this with Year 9-13 students and all have found it easy to follow and fun to complete.
A comprehensive 35 page revision guide I created for my students to help them with the Representation in TV Drama revision topic at AS. It includes a glossary of key terminology, lots of links to relevant You Tube clips for examples, images, information about each social groups, hints & tips etc.. a complete guide to everything a student should know before they take the exam
1) Film Trailer PPT - a selection of task and slides for lessons on film trailers including links to You Tube clips that are good examples of film trailers.
2) Structure of a Film Trailer - a revision sheet I use to help students remember the features of a film trailer and how they are structured usually.
A complete, detailed resource handy for students and staff taking this unit. It covers all the possible content for the first questions on the exam about their practical work AND covers all the content for the Collective Identity question on the paper for which we study representation of British people in film and television. It includes, content, a list of terminology, a guide to the relevant theories, practise questions and much much more. Enjoy!
A worksheet to help students understand how to analyse magazine front covers, along with a word document containing a large selection of magazine front covers useful for this exercise.
A powerpoint that give a full lesson plan idea for teaching students about company logos in advertising and marketing. The accompanying worksheet allows students to analyse popular logos. Great for teaching about connotations of font, image, colour etc
A complete pack of revision materials for Y11 students studying the AQA exam topic of Video Game Marketing. This document includes lots of activities which could be done in class or at home, research tasks and hundreds of practise questions. It also includes the mark scheme, key words, hints and tips, a space for you to input the theories you have covered with your students, and ideas for the practical tasks.
This is a comprehensive guide for students to the A2 Advanced Production (music videos) giving them step by step instructions on how to do ALL the planning tasks on their blog, hints and tips on the production and explanations of the evaluation questions. A great help to allow students to work independently whilst allowing teachers to spend more time doing one to one tutorials to help students / groups.
A total guide for revision for students and staff studying for the AQA exam this year Music Press. Includes lots of practise questions, tasks for students, factual information etc..
A Power Point containing lots of ideas for how to approach dominant ideologies / the magazine industry with students. I have focused on the representation of women in Cosmopolitan Magazine and used famously airbrushed images both on the power point and on the worksheet to engage the students.
a handy power point to illustrate the meanings of the word sign and signifier etc..
PLUS
a great worksheet for students to fill in to demonstrate their knowledge of signs and connotations etc..
A baseline test for new GCSE Media Studies students to assess their prior knowledge of the key concepts, and their creative design skills also. It assesses students knowledge of genre, audience, representation, institutions, media language and analysis, and design skills. The questions range from more open questions allowing for the students to give an extended answer, to short form questions requiring one word answers. There is also a hand drawn design question.
A great way of getting to know your new students at the start of the year and obtaining a 'baseline' of their current skills to help you with target grades and differentiating work. The test is designed to take around 45 minutes - 1 hour depending on students. Also supplied is a comprehensive mark scheme for the test along with suggested answers for the more open questions. There is also a guide to the grade boundaries for the current specifications (2016-2016) for Media although as the format is in Word, it is entirely editable to allow for it to be updated when the new specifications come into play.
Comprehensive guides to planning and making a film trailer, aimed at GCSE Media Studies or Film Studies students. They include detailed guides on the following:
* how to analyse real film trailers
* researching into a specific genre
* researching the conventions of a trailer
* carrying out audience research
* storyboarding a trailer
* pitching an idea for a film trailer / a written proposal
* evaluating your own film trailer
These booklets are 15/18 pages long (depending on which one you are looking at). One guide is aimed at GCSE students hoping to achieve A*-B grades and the other guide is a differentiated, slightly simpler version aimed at students working in the C-E range.
The guides do include the mark schemes for the AQA GCSE Media current spec, for Assignment 3 from the controlled assessment unit. However as the documents are in Word and entirely editable, this could easily be switched out for whatever mark scheme your students are currently using.
The booklets are great to print and staple and give out to students in class so they can get on with work independently, helping them to create a folder of research and planning. Alternatively they can be used a little like text books to give students a set piece of work to complete in a lesson or as homework.
A fun and easy practical style task for students to allow them to demonstrate their developing awareness of the connotations of different colours, angles, facial expressions, body language, locations, costumes, props etc..
This task is best done after a basic lesson on semiotic analysis of media language (I have a lesson about that on here too)
This activity involves allowing students to leave your lesson and go round the school taking photos in groups on their phones in an attempt to 'collect' a list of photos on the scavenger hunt sheet. The teacher will then mark the photos as and when the students regularly return to the room throughout the lesson (full instructions are on the powerpoint).
It is a fun way of introducing students to the connotations of different media language, and to group work, and photography. I often buy cheap little prizes eg chocolate bars for the group who took the best quality photos overall etc..
Aimed at beginner students at either GCSE or A-level with very little experience in analysis of media products. This full lesson has lots of visual examples, along with lots of tasks for students to do to help them learn how to decode media language and interpret meaning. The activity covers analysis of colour, body language, facial expression, font, costumes and props. A great introductory lesson for students at the start of their GCSE or A-level courses.
1) Ways of Classifying Audiences - gives students a better understanding of media and social grouping and demographics
2) Target Audience Description and Research - An activity i get my students to do for assignment 3 when they are making their magazines. This sheet shows them how to design an audience questionnaire AND how to analyse and present the results.
Two documents to help with assessing pupils, and to help pupils assess themselves. The mark schemes are based on the AQA GCSE Media Studies spec, for assignment bank 1 which we do advertising for. The numerical marks are accurate based on the spec, but the actual grades (A*-U) are 'guestimates' to help pupils see where they are at. There are two seperate mark schemes - one for the analysis, and one for the production part of the assignment.
