Becky Parry: PhD Candidate
Email: beckyparry.email@btinternet.com
Supervisors: Professor Jackie Marsh and Dr. Julia Davies
Working Title of Thesis:
Children and Children´s Films: What do children learn about narrative from their experiences of film?
Details:
Children´s films are significant to children; the films children encounter become an important element of their repertoire of experiences of narrative text. This significance is rarely recognised in education in the UK or in educational research. My PhD focuses on children´s film and in particular on the way in which children´s engagement and participation in film potentially develops their understanding of narrative texts.
My research questions include:
- What do children understand by the term ‘narrative’ and what ideas have they previously encountered about narrative structure?
- What knowledge and expectations do children have of existing narrative structures in children’s films?
- How useful are key concepts drawn from narrative theory to enabling children to understand how, for example, anticipation and narrative tension are constructed?
- How do children participate in the narratives of children’s films?
- How do children respond to familiar and unfamiliar narratives in films for children?
I have come to formulate my research questions in the context of reader response and narrative theory. I am currently undertaking field work at a primary school in Sheffield, using a collaborative and creative methodology for exploring these questions, working with six year five children.