American Girl Writing & Acting 5-Day Camp

Welcome to the American Girl Writing & Acting 5-day camp! In this creative writing and art camp, students will bring a doll's story to life with a movie, and celebrate it with a final premiere popcorn party. 🍿 Bring crafting supplies for props, filmmaking equipment (phones will work fine), and dolls for a week of fun and fantastic creativity. 🎥

Click play on the video to see a real student work sample from class. Congrats to my daughter's student film 'A Halloween Sleepover' for winning the Young Filmmaker Award in the Holidays 365 International Film Festival, being an official selection of the Kids First! Film Festival 2021, winning Outstanding Interpretation in the Reflections Arts Competition, and an Honorable Mention in the Fear Faire Film Festival! 🎃

This American Girl Writing & Acting class provides students with a 12-page printable workbook. I also wrote My Doll Journal and Filmmaking Notebook, which you can find on Amazon at https://amzn.to/3Rp8qQq. It is not required for the class.

Students will receive exclusive access to my filmmaking tutorial playlist with 18 videos that cover Flipgrid, Stop Motion Studio, iMovie, Green Screen, and more. You may work through the videos at your own pace as needed, and they will be available after class ends. If you need more specific instruction on the technology, you might sign up for my Stop Motion Studio class.

📷 Learn to Make a Stop Motion Animation Movie 5-Day Camp: https://outschool.com/classes/learn-to-make-a-stop-motion-animation-movie-yqwRljyt?sectionUid=7d3ea45f-3490-42c8-badd-acf6a3f75d57&usid=iTbVtqOS&signup=true&utm_campaign=share_activity_link 

The focus in this American Girl Writing & Acting Camp is storytelling through scriptwriting. Students' dolls will have a fantastic time starring in the movie! As the filmmaker, students have complete creative control over the finished project. Family and friends are welcome to help behind-the-scenes of the movie, but this can also be a completely independently-made movie created just by you.

In this class, students will compose a script for their dolls to act out in a movie. The scripts will become a movie or movie trailer that we will watch together during our final movie premiere celebration day! 🏆 Some students who love acting and performing might choose to be on camera and "become" the doll, like in the American Girl movies "Grace Stirs Up Success" and "Saige Paints the Sky". 

👀 Day 1: 
✅ I will share about my background as a web, video, and written content creator who has collaborated with American Girl for the past 5 years. Students will watch clips from American Girl stop motion and videos I created.
✅Three goals for the week will be presented: a final video, writing a short script, and filming practice videos throughout the week.
✅I will show three examples of how you could film the final video: stop motion, video, or mixed media (a mix of the two).
✅I will go through the three helpful tools for the week: the printable workbook, the video tutorials, and Flipgrid. Flipgrid will require either a Microsoft or Google logon from parents.
✔Students will brainstorm ideas for their original screenplay using sentence starters in a list. An example will be displayed as a model for the format of scriptwriting. 
✔Students can begin to film as soon as they have some of their script written. Filming can take place outside of class time to allow flexibility with location and actors, but students are also welcome to bring their props and filming equipment to film during class time.
💨💨For homework, students will record a video Introduction on Flipgrid using a menu of options, which allows them to choose from making a rough draft of their final video, an introduction about themselves and their dolls, or a summary of their script idea. If students are using Stop Motion Studio Pro, I recommend downloading it by the first day and trying it out.
💨💨The printable workbook offers a Check for Understanding page to complete after Day 1

👀Day 2:
✔Students will share their Flipgrid Introduction videos.
✅  Importing video files will be demonstrated using my own green screen video of Luciana and me traveling to outer space.
✅ I will show how to export using Stop Motion Studio and iMovie.
✅ Students will watch American Girl Z Yang's video on Editing Stop Motion, and they will study a walk cycle.
✅ Award-winning short film 'A Halloween Sleepover' will be shown to study production value.
✅ I will go over plot structure. I will provide students with time to describe the structure of their own story out loud.
✔Students will begin writing their script.
✔Technology questions will be answered.
💨💨 For homework, the Practice with Technology assignment is due on Day 4. It can be a 'Just for Fun' assignment to share videos students create throughout the week, or it can share part of student's finished movie, or it can share a commercial or trailer to get our class excited for your final movie. This assignment is required for anyone not using Flipgrid to make sure that exporting and importing files works well.
💨💨The goal is that by the middle of this class, students have a 1 - 1/2 page script they can film. It can be longer, but that can become more time consuming to film in one week.

👀Day 3:
✏️ This will be our Writing-themed Day! Students can come to class wearing a shirt with words or having their doll wear a shirt with words. ✏️
✅ Students will brainstorm about themes using photos of my dolls. Then, each student will share the theme for their story.
✅ I will share four key story elements that all students will have at this point in the week.
✔The 12-page printable workbook will provide a place for writing the final script. Students who purchase my book may use 'My Doll Journal and Filmmaking Notebook' to write their script in if they would prefer. It offers more journaling prompts to come up with ideas along with writing and filmmaking tips for writing the beginning, middle, and end to fit with the plot structure.
✔A self-evaluation checklist will be displayed while students write, and then they will have the chance to read their scripts out loud. 
💨💨 For homework, students will work on filming their movie. 
💨💨In the printable workbook, students will find a Check for Understanding page to review after this class.

👀Day 4:
✔ Students will share their Practice with Technology on Flipgrid.
✅ A series of photographs from my collaborations with American Girl (as well as some of their photos) will be displayed to show variety in shot sizes and camera angles.
✅ Students will choose three different shot sizes and camera angles to use with their final movie.
✔ Students will work on the shot list and storyboard sheet in the printable workbook. 5 storyboarding sheets are also available in my book 'My Doll Journal and Filmmaking Notebook,' where I included photos of the shot sizes and camera angles for students to refer to at home. Alternatively, you can sketch and write on notebook paper. 
✔  Students will work on filming their movie or crafting props. 
💨💨 For homework, students will film their movie, and they will share it to Flipgrid. 

👀Day 5:
🍿This will be the final premiere red carpet popcorn party movie celebration! Students can come dressed up as a movie star, movie director, in American Girl clothes, or as their favorite movie character. Dolls can dress up for their big red carpet debut too.🍿
✅ I will ask students to imagine walking into their red carpet movie premiere to watch their finished movie for their first time, and they will share their reaction.
✔An award sheet is in the printable workbook for students to give themselves a "best movie" award for something they worked the hardest on this week. The workbook also has tips for a red carpet party, like setting up a red carpet with towels or blankets, decorating the walls with a movie poster for your movie, and more. 
✔Movies will be shared for the class. If the class is over 5 students, the movies will be limited to 3 minutes viewing time, but the entire movie can be shared in the classroom if it is longer.
✔I will interview the student filmmakers, and the other students will share things they liked and noticed.

You will need to have a device that can enable a camera and microphone to record in Flipgrid. Flipgrid is a website and app that is available for free on iOS and Android. The final video can be recorded directly into Flipgrid. If you want to try more advanced technology with editing or stop motion and creating a separate file, you can upload it into Flipgrid or share a link to your video with the teacher before class. Please plan for the outside class time to increase if you use any program other than Flipgrid.

Some students have enjoyed filming as stop motion in Stop Motion Studio or as a video in iMovie before uploading to Flipgrid. Another popular technology is green screen. Since the focus in this class is storytelling with a focus on acting and writing, I may not have time to cover every technical skill during class. I provide video tutorials that you can watch outside of class time in case I'm not able to cover the topic as in depth as I would like during class time.