Academy takes good films to schools
The Kerala State Chalachitra Academy (KSCA), in association with Sarva Siksha Abhiyan (SSA), has opened a five-day workshop at the District Institute of Education and Training, Thrissur, on Monday, for the teachers to build up a new generation of film viewers and to help students better appreciate good cinema. About 50 teachers from various schools across the State are participating in the workshop, inaugurated by KSCA chairman K.R. Mohanan.
“Although film education is part of our syllabus, most of our schools do not have expert teachers or infrastructure to handle it. The academy has taken up a major scheme. We want to take good films to students and teachers. We will do a systematic evaluation of the scheme,” K.R. Mohanan said.
“Now, students have more access to the visual media. But unfortunately, the learning process is reduced to just theory classes. We teachers with conventional training become helpless in front of curious students,” said one of the participants. “It is an attempt to equip teachers to appreciate films more critically so that they can groom their students into creative consumers of films,” said noted film critic and member of Chalachitra Academy C.S. Venkiteswaran.
In the programme, the teachers and experts in the film world will discuss how to incorporate advances in the visual media into the learning process, recognize how visuals communicate and construct meanings and how to identify symbols used in the films to convey meanings beyond images. The academy has developed a whole set of reading materials as part of the package for the workshop in addition to screening film clips, ad films and feature films.
The academy and Sarva Siksha Abhiyan have already conducted one such workshop in Thiruvananthapuram and another will be held in Wayanad soon. The academy is also planning to conduct a series of film festivals in schools across the state during Onam.
