ESL teachers are often in search of new tools and activities that can increase motivation and learner autonomy (Murray, 1999; Blin, 2004) while accessing students' abilities as digital natives. While teachers have been incorporating video projects for the past decade or so, the projects themselves have been relatively simple in nature and design due to costs and limitations in the required video-editing software. Green screen, also known as Chroma key, is one such effect that once eluded amateur filmmakers. Green screen is the Hollywood special effect that allows the background of a scene to be replaced with another video or image. This technology can now be integrated into video projects in the ESL/EFL classroom at a low cost.

The presenters shared a wide variety of both student and teacher projects and the inexpensive ways those projects were created using any kind of light green material (22”x28” poster boards, fabric, a painted wall, muslin cloth), a video camera (even a smart phone), and video editing software such as iMovie-free on Macs, or PC programs like CyberLink’s Power Director Deluxe. Watch the video capture of this presentation.

Content-area teachers of subjects like history can have students transport themselves back to the 1900s and give reports on events as if they were actually happening at that time. Language teachers who focus on a theme, like the news, can have their students report from a professional-looking news studio and on location simply by finding appropriate pictures or video of the places where they want to be. Students who may be bored with PowerPoint presentations can present in an MTV-like style by finding videos and pictures to fill the green screen behind them while they speak to the camera. Even teachers having to follow a structured curriculum could take a half hour to film students performing dialogues in front of the green screen. The project is then easily edited to appear as if they were on location: giving directions on a desert trail in the Grand Canyon or on the streets in Spain during the running of the bulls. If preservice teacher-training is the goal, a green screen background can be replaced with a neutral solid color to give the video a cleaner and more professional look. Whatever context you are trying to convey, green screen is now an affordable and relatively simple way to make classroom instruction come alive.

REFERENCES

Blin, F. (2004). CALL and the development of learner autonomy: Towards an activity-theoretical perspective. ReCALL, 16(2), 377–395.

Murray, G.L. (1999). Autonomy, technology, and language-learning in a sheltered ESL immersion program. TESL Canada Journal, 17(1), 1–15.

Scott Duarte, instructor at the University of Delaware English Language Institute, came to the English Language Institute at the University of Delaware in August of 2012 from the English Language Center at Michigan State University. Prior to returning to the United States in 2008, Scott taught in high schools and universities in Korea, Japan, Indonesia, and Morocco. All of these opportunities gave him a wealth of experience and knowledge in teaching English in diverse environments. He has recently conducted teacher-training workshops in India and the Middle East through the State Department English Language Specialist program.

Julie Lopez, instructor at the University of Delaware English Language Institute, grew up in Colorado but completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington and her MA in TESL with Azusa Pacific University while teaching at the University of Hue in Vietnam. After 4 1/2 years in Vietnam, she settled in Delaware and has mainly taught intermediate-advanced academically-bound undergraduate and graduate students for the past 7 years.