The Film Club

I recently caught a Reel Channel interview of author David Gilmour and his son which focused on Gilmour's recent book “The Film Club”. As a homeschooling mother and a film buff, I found their story especially fascinating.

Rather than forcing his 16-year-old son to remain in the public school system- which was making him totally miserable - Gilmour allowed him to “drop out” with the condition that they would watch three films a week together. Gilmour said that since he feared his son would drop out of school eventually with or without his blessing, at least this way he could salvage their relationship. There were no lectures before the films, and no quizzes afterwards. The films were just a catalyst for the father and son to discuss important issues - both personal and global.

Although using films as a “core curriculum” did work very well for this father and son, it is probably not the best solution for most homeschoolers. However, films can be a wonderful supplement to any homeschool education.

I didn’t begin homeschooling my son, Dylan, until he was 11-years-old and had already established a firm opinion of what he considered to be a “normal” education. My decision that he would learn best by following his interests, then do his own research to find answers to his questions rather than having information spoon-fed to him just seemed crazy to him after 6 years in the public school system. The most difficult concept for him to accept was that I didn’t have to constantly test him to be sure he was actually learning. “No test? Are you sure that’s legal?”

Then, when I informed him that he could obtain a combination “history/science credit” just by watching “Inherit the Wind”, he was certain I’d lost my mind and started peeking out the window to make sure the “curriculum police” weren’t going to bust us. But, again, he found he was not going to get away with having information spoon fed to him by passively watching a movie. Whenever we would watch historic drama or historic fiction, we would discuss, not only the historic event or cultural/social climate of the period, but also how much of what was presented in the movie was historically accurate and how much could be attributed to artistic license. That always led to doing a little research, which led to more questions, which required further investigation.

When Dylan turned 13 he was able to join the Teen Movie Club organized by a member of our homeschool support group. Her goal was simply to expose the teens to good films and give them an opportunity to discuss them. The following year the Teen Movie Club was inherited by another member who decided to take the teens “around the world” in film. A film from a different country was shown each month. The organizing member would send an email with information about the country and links for the teens to explore and learn more about the country and its culture before watching the movie. The movies were screened in their native language with sub-titles at the club meeting. I gave Dylan Social Studies credit for his participation in Teen Movie Club that year.

Two years later, I took over as organizer of the Teen Movie Club and decided to utilize the American Cinema/American Culture video course (streaming lessons available for free at the Learner website). The Movie Club focus for this year would be to discuss how American cinema reflects, or possibly shapes, American culture. I assigned a one-hour video lesson from the series each month for the club members to watch on-line at home prior to the monthly meeting. I would then choose one of the movies discussed in the lesson to screen for the group at the club meeting. I purchased a used copy of the text for this course to use as a guideline to help keep the discussions going on the rare occasions that the group grew silent.

In order to present a clear picture of the evolution of American cinema and American culture, I decided the film choices should also follow the decades.

Our first film was Charlie Chaplin’s “The Gold Rush”, from the 1920s.

The following month the club watched “It Happened One Night” from the 1930s. Movie Club selections continued to progress through the decades providing not only examples of the film style of the representative decade, but also insights into the culture of the period.

Our final selection for the 2000s, “RV”, didn’t exactly qualify as a film, but it did provide an excellent representation of how technology is beginning to shape American culture and family dynamics in the 2000’s. It was also a fun way to send the teens off to summer vacation.

The teens seemed to enjoy this format for Movie Club. I can’t speak for the other club members, but my son not only learned quite a bit about American cinema, but he also gained new insights into American culture and how it has evolved from the 1920’s to the present. We incorporated these lessons into our own Social Studies curriculum that year.

So, while I couldn’t recommend films as the only resource for a homeschool education, I can wholeheartedly recommend films as a very effective way to slide into discussions about history, politics and social issues with your student.