Saints visit page (password protected)
April 09: Year 3 children have been looking at adverts (written, TV, cinema) and persuasive language. So far they have looked at a variety of magazine and newspaper adverts on a range of products and talked about their ‘key features’ such as colour, words, pictures, audience, size and impact.
They spent some time talking about slogans: what they are, how they work and how to make them effective. Here are a sample:
“Have a break, have a KitKat”, “Sainsburys: Try something new today”, “Homebase: Make a House a Home”, “Argos: Don’t shop for it, Argos it”, “Redbull: Redbull gives you wings”, “Tesco: Every Little Helps”, “Iceland: That’s why mums go to Iceland”.
Here are some of the products and adverts that the class liked:
Students were also set the task to identify the products and persuasive language in imaginary slogans, as well as come up with their own. There was a wide variety of products covered, a lot of cars with names such as ‘Dragonfly’, ‘Flame’ and words to do with speed, size and style. Children discussed the kinds of words that would be associated with their product and tried to incorporate them into their slogan. Toilet cleaner that makes your loo smell like chocolate was an original one!
To have a look at some adverts yourself, see below:
http://www.youtube.co.uk
adverts music: http://www.uktvadverts.com/Home/Search.aspx?company=146
http://www.ephinx.com/tvadverts/
17.4.09: In one lesson, the children looked at how TV adverts used words, images and music to persuade people to buy their products. They looked at two adverts and mind-mapped their ideas. (click on to enlarge) The Muller yoghurt advert has the famous ‘I Got Life’ song by Nina Simone and the slogan ‘Lick the lid of life’. The Comfort fabric conditioner advert has the ‘Do the Moves, release the freshness’ slogan and funky characters and music.
We also played a guessing game using pictures, words and music only. This included the very memorable song ‘Rockstar’ by Nickleback for the DFS sofa advert, Tony the Tiger for Frosties, Phil Colins style ‘drumming gorilla’ for Cadburys chocollate and Paddington Bear eating Marmite.
The groups then looked at the Pringles football advert featuring Steven Gerrard and considered the age, gender, familiarity and purpose of the advert. It was decided that the advert was selling a football skills camp as well as crisps.
Comparing written magazine adverts to film adverts was the next activity. Children worked in pairs to discuss how words, images and music were used in film trailers like Harry Potter and Shrek 3 as opposed to their poster versions.
Here’s a sample of the childrens’ opinions about the adverts and how they persuasive they thought they were in their blog…
Katie said “I liked the Shrek advert because of the really funny characters. It persuaded me to watch the film.”
Eleanor said “I liked the Harry Potter advert because the music was spooky. I would watch it and maybe watch the other films too.”
“I like the Harry Potter advert because it’s scarey and I would watch the film because I like scarey things.” Sophie
Lewis: ”Shrek would persuade me to watch it as it has got funny images.”
Siena “I like the background of the Shrek poster”
“I like Harry Potter because the advert music is mysterious. I liked Shrek because of the funny pictures.” Harry said.
“I liked the Harry Potter trailer as it was mysterious and a bit spooky, this might mean that the film is mysterious and spooky things happen there. I want to find out.” Ffion
Thomas “I like the Shrek advert, the images were funny.”
“The Shrek movie looks really good and funny from the advert, I will watch it.” Connor
Quincey: “I liked the Comfort advert because it was funny.”
Joshua “I like the music in the Shrek one because it is lively and the characters are good.”
Sam said “I thought the Cadburys gorrilla advert was funny with good pictures. I would buy the chocolate because of the gorrilla playing the drums.”
“I liked the Shrek 3 advert because of Donkey and his hilarious sentences.” Matthew
Juliusz said “The Harry Potter one had spooky music and images, it doesn’t have to be big, bold and colourful (BBC) to persuade me to watch it.”
Zak thought “The sofa advert was good because the Nickleback song was rock music and I like that”
“Shrek was funny because the characters were wearing silly clothes, it made me want to see why.” Josh
Laura said “The Muller yoghurt advert: the slogan was said many times which persuades me to eat it. There were lots of people eating it in the pictures, it must be good.”
Alden thought “The crisps advert, you must see it, its cool and funny with the football.”
“I like the characters on the Shrek 3 poster and would watch it.” Charlie
Julek “The words, images and music in the adverts were interesting.”
Jacob said “I like the Harry Potter film advert because the music is mysterious.”
Roushana “I thought Shrek was funny and I laughed.”
Lucie thought “The images in Harry Potter were spooky.”
“Harry Potter had slow calm spooky music.” Lola
“The Shrek film looked very funny.” Samuel
5.5.09: This week children have been looking at how film adverts’ sound effects and voice overs persuade people to watch the films. The class listened to the adverts for ‘Coraline’ and ‘Bolt’ and made notes on what sound effects they could hear, what they thought had made them as well as suggestions on alternative sound effects.
The voice-overs in adverts are very important too and the children examined what is said, by a male/female voice, the speed and volume and how persuasive it is.
The two films are very different and we had plenty to talk about when feeding back. A key aspect of these aspects of adverts is what emotions/feelings they provoke. The children had a go at writing a sentence to pull all these strands together:
“The sound effects in Bolt, especially the hamster, were funny and makes me want to watch it.” Katie George
Laura thought “The sound effects in Coraline made me feel quite amused and scared.”
Harry said “The sound effects in Coraline were spooky and I liked being spooked.”
“I heard the advert for Bolt and I liked it because of the words they picked out (voice-over) were funny.” Siena
“I haven’t seen the Coraline advert in full yet but the sound effects made me feel spooked and I liked feeling spooked.” Juliusz
Ffion: “The film Coraline is spooky, I want to know what happens from listening to the words. I like scary films.”
Eleanor said “The sound effects and voices made me feel it wasn’t safe in the other world in Coraline. It would make me watch it.”
“I thought Bolt sounded exciting.” Stephen-Jack
Sophie: “The words in Coraline made me feel sad because her ‘other mother’ was going to stitch buttons on her eyes.”
“The sound effects in Coraline made me shivery and spooked.” Lucie thought
“I liked Bolt because it sounded funny and it persuaded me to go and watch it.” Lewis
Julek: “The sound effects in Bolt were funny, I would like to see it.”
“On the TV advert of Bolt I liked it when I could hear the hamster breathe on the ball. I think he had a smiley face.”
“I felt silly when the hamster said ‘I eat danger’”
“The Bolt advert sounded very funny and I love to have a good laugh so I would watch it.”
“I liked hearing the cat, hamster noises in Bolt because it sounded like lots of action and cool. That is what persuaded me to watch it.”
Matthew: “I felt I was going to laugh a lot from listening to Bolt.”
“I want to see Bolt because I liked the hamster sounds because they are funny.”
“The voice-over were spooky, it made me feel scared.” said Roushana
Connor thought: “I want to see Bolt because the sound effects are funny.”
Alden: “Coraline made me feel scared and frightened, it was crazy which makes me want to see it.”
6.5.09: Radio adverts: Today the children looked at how sound effects and voice overs are used in radio adverts. They drew storyboard pictures to help them imagine a chocolate advert in ‘mental pictures’ and experimented with comic strips. In sequence, they altered the sound effects and voice overs using persuasive language.
7.5.09: Students listened to a variety of radio adverts and picked out their key aspects from the voice over: address, website, repetition of product/shop name, slogan, locality, description of product. This helped them start to write their own advert.
They used a storyboard comicstrip to plan out the ‘mental pictures’, sound effects and voice overs to go with their group’s chocolate bar. (They made the posters the week before and chose slogans, price and warapper) Here’s a sample of the student’s work: (click on to enlarge)
Here are some of their radio advert outlines, recordings (click on the highlighted names) and posters:
Ffion, Juliusz, Katie George, Siena: Forest setting, lady walks through forest, fairies give her some glitter and when its in her hands, it turns into a chocolate bar called ‘Magic Towers’. The slogan is “Taste the joy of Magic Towers.’ Sound effects include fairy dust (using a rainstick), flapping fairy wings (soft beat of a drum).
siena-ffion-juliusz-katie-george
Alden, Lucie, Stephen-Jack, Laura: ‘Penga-bar’. The girl buying the chocolate meets Penga and asks ‘Have you ever tried a Penga bar?” to which he replies “No” and tries the chocolate. He agrees that it is the best chocolate he’s ever had. They used ‘ching ching’ to show the cash register being opened in the shop.
laura-alden-stephen-jack-katie
Samuel, Lewis: ‘CatKats’ bar: A chocolate bar magically appears on a wall and the cats walk up to it then they eat it. Then they want some more and never stop eating it. The slogan is ‘If you have a cat, get CatKat.’ Sound effects will be ‘miaows’, clawing and scratching on a wall, (using our fingernails) magic sounds, crunching sounds.
Eleanor, Jaimie, Libby and Roushana: Their ‘Sparkle’ chocolate is very popular for helping a lady get through a long hard day. She eats the chocolate and feels much better as a result. She feels so much better she feels sparkly and goes dancing at the disco. This meant sound effects of disco music (with a special Sparkle song!) and ‘mmmm’ appreciation noises.
Jacob, Josha M, Joshua J: beach setting: A boy (called Josh) digs in the sand and finds ‘Josh’s Double Whammy’ and eats it. Sound effects are ‘huffing and puffing; because he’s tired, ’squelch’ because he’s near the sea and the sand is wet. Slogan: ‘The best chocolate bar ever’.
Connor, Julek, Thomas: sound effects include ‘Rip snap rip snap’ . This is Thomas ripping the chocolate bar open, its called ”Thomas’ terrific treat’. There is a spider involved somewhere and Thomas runs away!
Charlie, Zak and Quincy: an underwater theme here where a boy escapes from an octopus to eat his chocolate in peace in a cave. Then a squid comes and he has to eat the chocolate which helps him get away and have more energy. They used water to ‘bubble’ with and some frightened sounding screams when the boy swims away. It’s called “Q’s crunchy chocolate bar”
Sophie, Emily and Lola: They are selling their ‘Wunder Bar’ chocolate to girls so had the advert taking place in a beauty shop. They offered free make up to buyers as an incentive and had shop noises in the background.
Matthew, Harry and Sam: Their ‘Hot Rod’ bar had a car theme of course. Their cool hot rod driver stopped off at a shop to buy the bar (hence cash till noises) and then sped off in his car after enjoying it. This meant car revving sound effects and tyres screeching.
12.5.09: Making our own film adverts.
The class watched the short film ‘Carried Away’ by Zach Parish, a student film maker. Check out his website for a look at his other film ideas: http://www.zapmyshorts.com/site/zap/1/
A young boy blows a giant bubble that allows him to fly over his neighbourhood. He encounters various dangers on the way and his adventure shows how the world can sometimes burst your bubble. The film was a finalist for the 2007 Nicktoons Network animation festival and is described as “this CGI short will take you on a magical journey of whimsical delight”.
To watch it for yourself and see what you think, visit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ni3iod3m1UI
The group talked at length about what they thought about the film, whether it had the ‘key features’ of other adverts they had seen/heard. (written, radio, TV, film) These were mind-mapped on the board and included: BBC (big, bold, colourful), pictures, background, music, words, slogan, price, money off, rating, ‘best’, funny, adventurous, exciting, interesting…. All these features help persuade us to buy the product or watch the film.
The childrens’ task was to choose 4 clips from the 3.30mins film to make their 30 seconds advert. They had to explain their choices and how their clips would persuade others to see the whole film. Reasons included:
“I wanted to see what would happen next”
“I thought it was funny and I like funny films so would watch it”
“I could see the boy’s face, he looked so scared, I wanted to see if he would survive”
“I liked it when the girl came to rescue him, it brought some romance into it.”
“I thought it was a bit mad when he stepped into the bubble and took off flying.”
“I guess what might happen next and wanted to see if I was right.”
Emily Jane+Harry: Chose the clip of the boy ducking under the electricity wires in his bubble because they wanted to see what would happen.
Eleanor+Lewis chose the clip where the girl rescues the boy in her bubble because “It was romantic and funny.”
Sam+Siena chose the scene where the birds pop the bubble because “It is funny and mad because he goes upside down.”
Matthew+Josh M: Chose the clip where the boy waves at the girl because it makes them feel silly because she had to save him.
Ffion+Connor chose the clip where the boy blows the bubble and steps into it because “It’s the beginning of the story and it might tell you what it’s about.”
Alden+Charlie chose the clip where the boy catches the bubble mix bottle that the girl throws to him because “It is a nice scene, it is calm.”
The pairs found it difficult to select an exciting clip that didn’t give too much away. It was also hard to be precise, choosing clips at an exact point in the film, not including whole scenes. This is what film editors have to do all the time.
The class mind-mapped the emotions they felt when watching the film and in relation to specific clips. Here is their list:
Amused excited emotional
Depressed frustrated weird
Outstanding calm crazy
Carried away happy worried
Inquisitive confused mad
Creative scared inpatient
Amazed wonderful terrified
Surprised frightened love
Astonished wowed funny
Shocked sad
The children used a writing grid to put their emotions into sentences.
Laura and Jamie said they felt “Crazy because you don’t see many people back flipping into bubbles in the air” in regards to the backflipping bubble clip.
“I am frightened that he will fall” said Emily-Jane and Harry about when the boy’s bubble is pecked and burst by some birds.
“We felt surprised because we thought he wasn’t going to make another bubble” said Katie-Alice and Quincy about the clip where the boy is falling through the air after falling out of his bubble and he manages to blow another.
Samuel and Roushana said they felt “calm and happy because the music is calm” when watching the boy floating over the neighbourhood in his bubble.
Frustration was the emotion felt by Joshua and Lola about when the boy was jumping around inside the bubble as “we thought he shouldn’t be doing that.”
Sophie and Stephen-Jack said they felt “scared because they weren’t sure what was going to happen to the boy” in regards to the boy approaching the electricity wires.
Surprised was how Zak and Lucie felt when the boy “does a somersault into his bubble and the bubble doesn’t burst.”
Libby and Thomas had this to say: “It was exciting because it happened at the beginning of the movie” about the clip where the boy first makes a bubble and gets into it.
14.5.09: The children were asked to write exciting sentences as voice overs about their chosen clips.
“Where did she come from?” was the voice over from Katie and Jacob for the clip where the girl jumps into a bubble.
“He jumped and screamed inside the bubble, only to avoid the danger.” was the sentence from Juliusz when the boy is approaching the electricity wires.
For the clip where the boy blows the bubble at the start of the film, Sam and Siena’s voice-over was: “Have you ever heard of a boy who can get in a bubble?”
For the clip where the boy does a back-flip into a bubble t save himself, Lucie and Zak’s voice over was: “Wow! There’s a new bubble, what will he do next? What a clever kid!”
The next task was to use voice directions in the exciting voice-over sentences. Children thought about voice speed, volume and expression/emotion when using their voices. In their pairs, they acted out the two versions: one reading the voice-over sentence normally and one reading it again with the voice directions applied. We saw and heard some great role-play/drama with some pairs really exaggerating their voices, just like they do in film adverts.
Lucie+Zak read their sentence “Here come the birds!” using the voice directions ‘medium loud, fast, excited’.
Sam+Siena applied the directions ‘fast, medium loud and madly’ when reading their voice-over “Will he drop down or will he blow another bubble?”
Juliusz read his voice-over “Out of nowhere a girl came out of the sky and saved him!” with the voice directions ‘fast, loud and heroic’.
‘Loud, mysterious, slow’ is how Katie-George and Jacob said their voice-over “He takes a deep breath and pops the bubble…..BANG!”
