Girotondo

Film-based learning in early Italian instruction at high school.

Abstract

This article presents the short film project Girotondo, carried out during a project week with an upper secondary school class that had been learning Italian for only one year. The students collaboratively produced a 13-minute short film entirely in the target language. The article illustrates how film-based project work can be implemented as an effective, motivating and reflective learning environment even at an early stage of language learning. Drawing on current research in project-based learning, performative pedagogy and Task-Based Language Teaching, it shows how exposure, imitation, learner agency and media production foster linguistic, media-related and social competences. The project is presented as a response to the challenges of foreign language learning in a digital and AI-driven era.