robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

The first thing I did was show about a dozen images of different subjects/types and printed in 13 x 19 on different types of paper to show how the paper surface changed the images. The one on Red River metallic (macro of puff ball seed heads in the yard) really got some uhs and ahs as they saw how changing the viewing angle made it seem to be 3D with a hint of motion.
Your other ideas will be added to the lists I will make from this thread.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

all good points, I had planned on a table top set up for still life or macro toward the end of the lessons.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

I have thought of making copies of the instructional DVDs as I have a CD/DVD/BlueRay burner in my desktop.

I recommended the Northrup's "Stunning Digital Photography" book in e-book form with links to over 20 hours of tutorials on line or in SD card - I have the SD card and can make copies, I think.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

They are all at the "how do I turn it on and use it stage". But I will make a "survey sheet" for next meeting to learn just what they want to do. If all everyone wants to do is family photos and travel photos I can concentrate on that and the "how to..." for their gear and just do quick demos of other things for them to think about.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

That is part of the plan.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Well they are authorized to put Nat Geo emblems etc on the packaging and once long ago I saw a blurb telling about the courses on a Nat Geo site.

Patrick Walls

I learned a few good techniques in workshops from Freeman Patterson (renowned Canadian photographer)over the years. You might want to try (if you haven't already planned these):

(1) Amateur photographers are always "over-anxious" to share their work. Make sure you do not wait too long to allow a show-and-tell experience

(2) To ingrain a sense of "creativity," have everyone in the class take pictures of one item (in a room or outside) and bring their pictures back to the next class. You could have them email shots to you before the class, so you could better control the presentation (time) of their work. It is always surprising to "see" what others "saw" while looking at the same object

(3) Present a number of your photographs of the same scene/object from a variety of perspectives to demonstrate how the photographic artist differs from the painter/drawer artist. IE: The painter/drawer "adds" detail to the canvas, while the photographer/artist "takes detail away" from his/her canvas

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Yes, on line sites will be introduced and mentioned but after I get them going a bit.
And believe me I have been doing on line research since the early 90's while teaching. The school I was at was a federal grant "Digital High School" and we had computers in every classroom and fiber optics on campus with a commercial grade access server to the net.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Already told to use the composition tip handouts and start taking pictures, even the ones who only have cell phones. I told them after a while they will know better what kind of photography they want to do and therefore what kind of camera and lenses they will need.

I did 1 year student teaching and 34 years at the Jr & Sr High level in LA. And not just the 9 months a year I taught summer school, extra classes and when at a multi track year round school I sometimes taught inter session (like summer school but not necessarily in the summer and usually happened twice a year) or even two intersession classes a year. At 9 months a year service credit 34 years = 25.5 years service credit. I had 32.25 when I retired so I made the state pension "longevity bonus" (that bought me a BIG Plasma TV for the living room-$5K in 2007 when I retired) and an extra $500 a month on my pension.

Jameslcwik

Well said. I totally agree with the senior/over 55, etc, categorization. Why are we any different? Books, classes, and all that crap that address us that way annoy the hell out of me.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Bear with the ramble below... I promise it has a point.

Interesting you talk about teaching Jr. High students. I'm almost entirely self-taught. I began getting really serious about photography in 1968, in 8th grade. I made most of the candids and sports photos for our yearbooks until I graduated high school 4-1/2 years later. I subscribed to three photo magazines, and read the entire Time-Life Library of Photography as the books came out in the early 1970s.

In the mid-1970s, those slide shows you mentioned would have been controlled by early computerized multi-image projection systems. AVL, ClearLight, Arion, Spindler & Sauppe, and some others were cranking out digital dissolve controllers and programming computers as fast as they could engineer them. You could use them "live" by pre-programming sequences of slide changes, and then triggering them with a key on the controller. Or, you could program them to tape (paper tape early on, then magnetic tape) and synchronize them to narration, music, and sound effects.

Kodak did a bang-up job on their presentations. So did Dean Collins, a photographer, trainer, and photo educator. He had nine Hasselblad projectors and used medium format slides. Nikon School had a traveling road show as well. The Association for Multi-Image grew rapidly. There were 800+ attendees in Orlando in 1983, when I saw 123 multi-image programs in five days (anywhere from two to 30 projectors, plus 16mm film and video!). The guy with a two-projector show in black-and-white (Jim Richardson) won the top award that year for Reflections from a Wide Spot in the Road. It probably brought all 800 of us to tears a couple of times.

I got into the yearbook and school portrait business in 1979, as an AV producer. I joined AMI, and produced and programmed multi-image shows for our creative services group for 8 years. It was the most fun job I ever had. But I don't miss cleaning six surfaces for each glass mounted slide (two pieces of glass and a piece of film). And I don't miss schlepping a truck load of 12 projectors, four speakers, two amps, and three large screens to a sales meeting, only to spend a day setting it all up for three 30 minute shows!

These days, everything is digital. We can do — with a digital camera, some mics, a Mac, and software — what used to take millions of dollars worth of high end film and video gear to do in 1980.

My advice to you is this: Cover a little bit of everything, with an emphasis on access to information and resources. Be sure to touch on ICC Color Management (monitor calibration and profiling, printer profiling, matching papers and profiles to printers...).

The subject of photography is broad and deep. There is no one right way to teach it, learn it, or do it.

If I have one mantra for students, it is to concentrate on the "message" you are "sending" to a viewer. The medium should be transparent to the message. BELIEVE that Marshall McLuhan was wrong. The medium isn't the message. The message is the message! That was the lesson I took from Jim Richardson's slide show winning top honors over million dollar productions.

When a photo is so appealing a viewer just falls into it, you know you have a winner. We used to say, "When they cry, they buy," about customers viewing proof shows of senior portraits.

Photos can teach, inform, record history, remind, move people emotionally, even change lives and the *course* of history. Having a point and a point of view counts. Technology is neat, but what we do with it to produce compelling images is where the action is. Knowing that at an early age was enough to inspire me to work on my "technical chops".

Sometimes, monkeys see and then do. So encourage students to view a gazillion good photos. Look through photo books, go to exhibits, watch YouTube videos on photography, and do whatever is possible to feed your head good images.

Classrooms are nice places to learn, but immersion is required to put that structured knowledge to good use. As the late Frank Zappa said, "If you want to learn about sex, go to college. If you want an education, go to the library and educate yourself." (I said, "Where's the college library?")

Dive into your craft head first and learn to swim. Surface, go to class, then dive in again.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Everyone ages differently. Often dependent on the life they lived (and good or bad genes).
My Great Grandfather was a farmer and after he retired to town to live with my Great Aunt and Uncle kept a 2 acre garden with hand tools. At 89 the doctor told him he was developing a heart condition and to take it easy. (only the third time in his life he went to a Dr - 16, broken arm - 65, check up for SS - 89 "felt tired too much") Well he kept up the garden but hired a high school kid to use a mule to plow the garden instead of his one wheel hand pushed plow. He died in his sleep of a heart attack a few weeks short of 92. He was born in 1865 and died in 1957 when I was 12.
On the other hand I have seen people broken and ready for 24 hour care by 60.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

The books I have already mentioned.
The critique etc comes after they get past the "how to turn it on" and "how to take and get the pictures out of it" stage.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

All noted for my lists and lessons.

IDguy Loc: Idaho

I met a friend of my wife today who is 91. She was neat as a pin, drove herself to our meeting, and runs a number of things such as religious groups and a local festival. Most people seeing her would think she is 60ish.

She was fully up on the news of the day local and National (the latter with disgust: this is Idaho 🤪).

And then there are those you see at Walmart...

Something sent to me last week on my 73rd: https://youtu.be/yc5AWImplfE

I shared it with my skiing buddy.