Artistic narrative documentaries for the classroom
nextus presents 30 international documentary films that offer students a horizon-expanding view of world history in the 20th and 21st centuries. The content is aimed at young adults between 15 and 30 years of age and is thus suitable for teaching at high schools, middle schools, technical and vocational high schools, and universities.
Teachers can customize their lessons choosing from the carefully curated documentary feature-length films and short film sequences on a variety of topics. With diverse documentary perspectives on world events, the 3-7 minute film clips enable a cross-curricular form of learning as young people can experience history, politics and society from different perspectives. How does it feel to grow up as the grandson of a guest worker? What was youth in the GDR like? And what does a contemporary witness tell us about the Warsaw Ghetto?
Following the curriculum of secondary schools, the documentary films can be used in the subjects of history and German but also in social studies, ethics and religion, politics, economics and law. The main topics are the October Revolution in 1917, World War I and World War II, the devastating consequences of the Holocaust, economy, politics, art and society from the post-war period to the 2000s, emancipation and women's rights, citizens' movements, terrorism, democracy and human rights.
In addition to the global history nextus also addresses national events: Films and film sequences on the German-German border, the Red Army Faction, but also on the National Socialist Underground are represented, as are documentary films on the Greek-Turkish War of 1919-22 and the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39. Thus, nextus offers an exciting addition to foreign language classes. The subtitled films and the accompanying media educational material are available in German, Greek, Spanish, Catalan and English.
Participate as a partner school
In order to be able to evaluate and further develop the beta version of the digital platform together with teachers and school classes, we are making it available free of charge to secondary schools throughout Germany. For one school year, you will have free access to all documentary films and collections of various thematic film clips. The schools will receive their own access, which is valid for the entire staff and student body. The teachers of a partner school can thus work with the platform across subject classes.
Development and evaluation of nextus
The platform is in constant development and will continue to grow internationally and thematically with new participating countries and film titles. A team of experts is also developing the interactive usability of the platform for teachers and students. The latter will have the opportunity to exchange information with school classes from Greece and Spain via the platform and to develop lesson models based on the documentary films. DOK.education accompanies the test phase with individual teacher training and a final evaluation. Teachers and students will be asked about their experiences, wishes and suggestions. By participating as a partner school, you will gain insight into the development of a great documentary film platform for schools and complement an international creative team of an EU-funded project.
Contact
Are you interested in participating as one of our partnerschools? Please feel free to contact us.
Project coordination:
Kathi Seemann, education@dokfest-muenchen.de
DOK.education, educational programme of the International Documentary Filmfestival Munich e.V.
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