Earlier this year, Jackie Hjelden’s second and third grade Navigator class took part in the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival, with groups of students working together to tell the stories of Newbery-winning books. Submitted videos are featured on the video contest website, and several are selected to play in-person at a film festival in various locations across the county.  This year, James Kennedy, the contest founder, invited all of the groups from Hjelden’s class to the festival to see their projects on the big screen! 

According to Hjelden, the purpose of this project was to teach students teamwork, technology and communication skills while incorporating academic reading, writing, speaking and listening skills in a fun and creative way. 

“Each fall, kids select a good-fit Newbery book to read and discuss in a book group,” explained Hjelden. “Throughout the unit, students read assigned pages of the book and meet in a group each week to discuss. In preparation for the group meeting, they infer and provide text details to support those inferences, generate level 2 and 3 questions and points for discussion for the group discussion, and they write a chapter summary for each chapter read.”

This year, Andy Smith, Minnetonka Schools’ video production and audiovisual specialist, came into the class to teach students how to create a storyboard for their short videos. 

“The kids absolutely love the video creation process,” said Hjelden. “All of their hard work leading up to this point pays off and their creativity comes alive. This year, our videos included Lego sets and characters, paper mâché puppets, Minecraft, green screen work and acting out the scenes themselves as characters in the book.”

The 90-second video project provides an opportunity for students to learn and grow academically and creatively, and it’s most students’ favorite part of their school year, said Hjelden. 

Great work, Skippers!