Brer Rabbit and Dialect in Early Educational Film Strips
In 1965 the students of Mercer Elementary in Shaker Heights, Ohio served as guinea pigs for use of educational film strips in the classroom — the wave of the future!
The experiment, Project Discovery, sought to demonstrate the effectiveness of audio/visual learning in school. It’s credited with jump starting the academic film industry and toppling a few textbook publishers along the way.
Brer Rabbit is featured prominently in this film about Project Discovery, and the kids from Shaker Heights have a few things to say about the southern accent.
The entire film is 30 minutes and excellent. Near the end they let Philip talk for a few minutes, and goodness gracious it is hilarious. If this hadn’t been the greatest challenge of my life to date, I would have embedded the whole thing here.
(h/t Gregg. Thanks!)
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Amber Suitt
Program Director
Lain Shakespeare
Executive Director
1 Comment to Brer Rabbit and Dialect in Early Educational Film Strips
It is interesting to see the change in the student make-up of Mercer School over the years. I wonderful how the diversity impacts the classroom discussion?