markngolf Loc: Bridgewater, NJ

Might be an excellent reading source for the kids, too!! Look into school discounts or support by the district. I taught for 40 years. Loved it the entire time.
Mark

Whuff Loc: Marshalltown, Iowa

Ask around amongst the people you know. Someone you know is a photographer and can give you a crash course in just an hour or two on how to use the camera you have. Then go out and practice - a lot. This assumes of course that you’ve done the ground work of reading your camera’s manual with camera in hand and tried all of the functions and modes.

Walt

srt101fan

For you and your students to learn it might be useful, as a group, to look at, study, and discuss photographs. Select images in a range of styles, subjects, moods, degree of post processing,etc. Look at old and current masters (I'm sure you can get plenty of suggestions from this forum!). Discuss what "makes" a photograph - why is it appealing? What kind of reaction does it cause in you and why? Look for specific elements and features that attract your attention; etc,etc,etc. Then go on to try and understand how the photographer got what he got. That will open the doors to the study of the technical aspects of photography.

Good luck with your work. A noble and admirable endeavour!

Paulco2 Loc: Gettysburg PA

There is a lot of great advice above. My first thought is that you don't need to be an expert to lead a camera club. As a teacher you understand that we learn by doing and evaluating the results, thus a project to take pictures of a certain type (e.g. portraits) will lead to everyone taking pictures and discussing what makes the best ones good and what detracts from the less good ones increases everyone's understanding (including yours) of what makes for good portraits.


A note on how I started with my first DSLR, a Nikon D300: I read the manual, got confused and bought a book (J. Dennis Thomas's "Nikon D300 Digital field guide") that made things much clearer. I would assume that similar books are available for whatever camera you have. I then shot pictures and evaluated until I began to understand what the camera could and couldn't do. I then joined a photo club and continued learning through the activities of the club. Of course, that process continues today.


Welcome to the UHH family and good luck!

dsmeltz Loc: Philadelphia

You can also treat cameras and gear the same way you treat other media. There is a difference in what can be achieved with watercolor, oil, acrylic, etc.... Likewise there are differences in what you can do with a cell phone, a DSLR with various lenses, Post Processing, Black and White.... Having them play with different systems/approaches for a single project might be interesting.

There are a lot of challenge articles out there where pro photographers are asked to compete with the same model or subject or are asked to use a very old digital camera or even a toy camera. These limitations can force creativity.

Pepsiman Loc: New York City

Go to You Tube, Photography. There are lots to learn there

pappleg

Online video courses offered by "The Great Courses" offers a course by National Geographic photographer Joel Sartore called Fundamentals of Photography that is both comprehensive and excellent consisting of every aspect of photography in I believe it was 27 episodes of 30-40 minutes each. I managed to complete it in a 30 day free trial. I have been a semi-professional for many years doing weddings and commercial work as a side job and my motivation was I began last year teaching photography at a senior center and I wanted to be certain I covered everything. Look for a trial membership but even if you have to pay something it is well worth it.

Pat

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Read Understanding Exposure by Bryan Petersen and Stunning Digital Photography by Tony Northrup.

Oh, my kind mantra: RTFM — Read The *Fine* Manual. ‘Japlish’ isn’t fun to read, and wading through several hundred pages of technological gaga may be torture, but it WILL make you a more tech-savvy photographer.

If your school library or public library has a set of the Time-Life Library of Photography, read or skim that, as it provides many perspectives on many topics in the discipline.

The smartphone and the Internet have democratized photography, a “sport”, hobby, art, or profession that used to have very high barriers to entry (expenses and learning curve). Now, over 90% of all images are made on phone cameras. Photo and video sharing sites are jammed full of great images. There’s still 80% “crap”, but much of that is better than the “good” imagery of 40 years ago.

That’s good! It means your students take for granted many of the concepts we used to have to learn. They still need to learn digital technology (adjustable cameras, various lights, computers, software, calibration tools, printers...), but they already know/assume/process more about imaging than we did prior to 1999.

Your ability to teach and function as a digital photographer is heavily dependent on your knowledge of computers, and the software tools used for imaging. Don’t let it intimidate you, or your students. All of what you learn is applicable to the ENTIRE field of “convergence media” — electronic text composition/typography, telephony, video, audio, photography, web design, and all the combinations and permutations of them.

Regarding film photography: Film is dead! Long live film! It’s now a niche medium. It’s used mostly by old photographers, art teachers, their students, and technological luddites. If you like it, fine. I used it long enough — from 1960 to 2005. I had several B&W and color darkrooms, made tens of thousands of slides as a multi-image AV producer, and ran various parts of a large photo lab in both the film era and the early digital era (1987 to 2005). So I know, first hand, that digital processes are far more precise, predictable, controllable, versatile, practical, and efficient than film/optical/chemical processes. But they do require a broader knowledge base!

Dr. Nicholas Negroponte said it best, over a decade ago: “Bits beat atoms.” Modern and most future imaging is digital. To use film images, other than as prints, we must scan them to digital files.

Your students already understand and believe that bits DO beat atoms! They grew up with mice and smartphones in their hands. I encourage you to teach film imaging as an historical element of photography, and digital imaging as what your students are most likely to use. I can assure you, I’ve not found anything digital photography cannot achieve better than film.

Film may seem to be a less costly medium for schools to teach! It does have a certain “cool factor” for some folks. The catch is, it is no longer the mainstream medium of choice. So teaching film *without*, or *instead of*, or *as a prerequisite to*, digital media, could be cruel and unusual punishment for students.

Digital photography is a crucial element of a MUCH broader media environment. There is art to it, but it is also a visual language, with many related and inter-woven disciplines. You may want to partner with a computer science teacher and/or electronic media arts teacher, English teacher, or journalism teacher to fashion curricula.

camerapapi Loc: Miami, Fl.

You have to begin by learning the basics of photography. Then learn how to operate your camera.

dsmeltz Loc: Philadelphia

Want to expand on the painting/photography analogy. Within DLSRs you can think of the length of lenses like different materials and the aperture and shutter speed like shading and blending. Of course to understand that, reading books like "Understanding Exposure" and "Stunning Digital Photography" would be very helpful. Perhaps start with "Stunning" since it provides articulation of ideas that might be useful to your students.

Just like painting, it all starts with knowing your materials and how you can use them to achieve your goal.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

I can't really disagree with what you so well said there, but there is some resurgent interest in film photography and even alternate chemical based photo based non-silver photography and printing by many younger photographers. Many as you noted even like to use "toy" cameras (something I would not touch) and Polaroid materials. This nostalgic movement in photography is similar to the new found interest in vinyl LPs again by many young music fans and collectors. Even I thought new LP releases were dead long ago. It seems for many millennials analog is cool again. I myself have seen a number of 20-somethings using vintage film cameras. I still have and occasionally use 35mm and 4x5" but I've firmly gone digital.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Composition is major. Using the Auto setting will get you good quality images, but you need interest. Try YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=photo+composition

TJ28012 Loc: Belmont, NC

👍 Learn from them. Maybe even find a personal trainer.

gvarner Loc: Central Oregon Coast

You're leaps and bounds ahead with an emphasis on artistic vision. That's what photography is really all about. Without it you take pictures, with it you make pictures. Engage the students in jointly critiquing their photos with respect to composition and impact, the "why" of being a good photo. It's all about painting with light, both natural and artificial. The technical part, the "how" of a good photo, receives way too much attention in my humble opinion unless it's discussed in relation to composition and impact. Also you might want to discuss their ideas of how they want to present their photos - LCD screen viewing, on a computer monitor, as a print, in a photo show on a TV screen. All of these influence how much knowledge you need and what kind of initial digital quality you have to start with. These are just some of my thoughts.

bentaylor43 Loc: Inman SC

For the last 4 years I have taught a Photo Club, but mine have been 4th and 5th grade Boys and Girls Club members.
Your 9th and 10th graders won't be much different. I found that keeping the technical stuff to a minimum was best; about the most important technique was how to hold their cameras. Things will be easier if they all have similar cameras and that you know how to help with their questions about the functionality. Cell phones and point-and-shoot cameras are just fine. I found that teaching by projects work well for most children such as making pictures with texture one week, contrast another, point-of-view, props, etc. Kids could care less about technicalities of f-stops, ISO and shutter speeds. Udemy courses"Become a better photographer 1 and 2" are inexpensive and will help a lot. Children will work harder in teams and toward a goal like a photography show or their pictures in the newspaper. I will be happy to talk with you. email sept21@windstream.net