There are different ways to use photography to educate children on many aspects and details in life. Here are education topics that can be combined with photography:
- Human body growth: In the classroom, teachers can photograph some children next to permanently placed objects, like windows and blackboard. Children are growing quickly and they could see how they grow every six months. Teachers and students will be able to measure and discuss differences.
- Introduction to the nature: During a nature hike session, the class can be assigned to take photos with cameras or even smartphones. They should be told to take photos of specific rocks, plants and animals that can be found in the area. These images can be collected and identified in the classroom. This will enhance the education process, instead of only showing children pictures of animals and plants in textbook. Children will be able to understand about the nature subject, if the pictures used in the classroom are taken directly from the nature.
- Computer editing: Photography doesn’t stop only on the viewscreen of the camera. Pictures can be transferred to computers for editing and enhancing. In this case, digital photography should be considered as a way to teach children about proper computer skill. This could be a way to start interest among children about computer usages. Photo editing is also important to improve creativity among children. Children who are able to come up with proper editing results should be praised and the picture can be hung in the classroom.
- Photography as an art: The most obvious education topic related to photography is using it as a form of art. There are elements of photography that we can incorporate, such as lighting, posing, composition, editing and others. In this case, we can perform reviews on certain famous photos made by professionals and ask students to try emulating them.
- Growth of plants: Photography can be used to teach children about the rate of growth in the plant kingdom. The easiest way to do this is by making a time-lapse video. We could tell them to regularly capture photos of sprouting seeds and measure the rate of growth. The key to this activity is consistency and photos can be stitched together to create a video. The interval of time between photos should be equal, so we could get a real rate of progression.
Photography can be an exciting activity in school and teachers should encourage students to create their own photo clubs to improve their skills further. As a start, they could use available resources, such as affordable digital cameras or even just cameras on their smartphones. They could create bulletin boards that are updated regularly to show best photos that they took this month. Students could also work with school newspaper to contribute some photos about specific events. During school tour, the photography-inclined students could find more activities that interest them.