Storyboarding a video on photosynthesis

carbon dioxide + water → glucose + oxygen, with light energy and chlorophyll written above the arrow.

(a) It diffuses from the air into the leaf through the stomata, tiny pores mostly on the underside of the leaf.

(b) Chlorophyll absorbs light energy. It is found in the chloroplasts.

(c) For respiration, to release energy; stored as starch; made into cellulose for cell walls. (Also accept: joined with minerals from the soil to make proteins.)

(d) All the time, day and night. They only photosynthesise in the light.

Who: Year 6 pupils, aged 10 to 11. They know plants need light and water to grow, but probably not the words glucose, chlorophyll or stomata.

Where and how: on the school website, often on a phone with the sound off. So I need closed captions, large text and a video short enough to hold their attention.

3 things they must understand: plants make their own food from carbon dioxide and water using light; it happens in the chloroplasts of leaves, which are shaped for the job; the glucose is used for respiration, starch and cellulose, and plants respire all the time.

Words to explain: chlorophyll, stomata, glucose.

Frame	Gethin wrote	Correct version	Type
1	photosinthesis	photosynthesis	Spelling
1	make there food	make their food	Spelling
2	Plants breathe in carbon dioxide	Plants take in carbon dioxide, which diffuses into the leaf through the stomata	Science
2	The roots takes in water	The roots take in water	Grammar
3	clorophyll	chlorophyll	Spelling
3	cloroplasts	chloroplasts	Spelling
3	The stomata is green and soaks up the light	The chlorophyll is green and absorbs the light. (Stomata are pores for gases; note stomata are, as it is plural.)	Science
4	it gives out carbon dioxide	it gives out oxygen	Science
5	The plant used some of the glucose	The plant uses some of the glucose (the rest of the narration is in the present tense)	Grammar
5	resperation	respiration	Spelling
5	Plants only respire at night	Plants respire all the time, day and night	Science
6	The leafs is broad	The leaves are broad	Grammar

(b) 1. The frame 1 picture is copied from Google Images with no permission or credit: use my own drawing or photo, or a Creative Commons image credited at the end. 2. Yellow letters on a white sky have poor contrast: use black text on a white band. 3. The frame 4 caption is 22 words, which nobody can read in 4 seconds: cut it to the word equation. (Also accept: no closed captions; no credits card; a pop song is protected by copyright.)

(c) 31 ÷ 2.5 = 12.4 seconds, so 13 seconds rounded up, 14 with the pause. He allowed 4, so the narrator would have to gabble at nearly 8 words per second.

(d) 130 ÷ 2.5 = 52 seconds, or 58 with a 1 second pause at each of the 6 frames. That is under 60 seconds, so it does not meet the brief: he needs more content, such as what chloroplasts and stomata are for and what cellulose is.

Frame	Key message	Shot type
1	A tree grows huge without eating: so where does its food come from?	Wide shot
2	A plant needs water from the soil and carbon dioxide from the air.	Close-up
3	Chlorophyll in chloroplasts absorbs light energy.	Extreme close-up
4	The word equation.	Diagram
5	Leaves are broad and thin.	Close-up
6	What the plant does with glucose, and respiration all the time.	Diagram

Frame	Sketch	Narration	Caption	Words / s
1	Wide shot: my photo of the oak tree on the school field, a child beside it for scale.	This oak tree has never eaten a meal, but it has grown taller than a house. So where does its food come from? The answer is photosynthesis.	Photosynthesis: how plants make food	27 / 12
2	Close-up drawing: roots in the soil with blue arrows; the underside of a leaf with grey arrows into the stomata.	A plant makes its own food. It needs two raw materials. Water comes up from the soil through the roots. Carbon dioxide, a gas in the air, passes into the leaf through tiny holes called stomata.	Water from soil, carbon dioxide from air	36 / 16
3	Extreme close-up drawing: a tall palisade cell full of green chloroplasts, with yellow sunlight arrows.	Inside the leaf are palisade cells, packed with tiny green parts called chloroplasts. They contain chlorophyll, a green substance that absorbs light energy from the Sun.	Chlorophyll absorbs light energy	26 / 12
4	Diagram: the word equation, each word appearing as it is said.	The plant uses that light energy to turn carbon dioxide and water into glucose, a type of sugar. Oxygen is made too, and it passes out of the leaf into the air.	carbon dioxide + water → glucose + oxygen (light energy, chlorophyll above the arrow)	32 / 14
5	Close-up: a hand holding a thin, broad leaf up to the light.	Leaves are shaped for the job. They are broad, so they catch lots of light, and thin, so carbon dioxide does not have far to travel.	Broad and thin: built to catch light	26 / 12
6	Diagram: arrows from “glucose” to a running figure, a potato and a cell wall.	The plant uses glucose for respiration, which releases energy, day and night. It stores some as starch and makes cellulose for its cell walls. Every plant is a food factory!	Glucose: respiration, starch and cellulose	30 / 13

(a) 12 + 16 + 12 + 14 + 12 + 13 = 79 seconds, plus 4 for the credits card = 83 seconds. That is inside 60 to 90 seconds, with 7 seconds spare.

(b) Closed captions: the full narration, word for word, which viewers can switch on, so families watching with the sound off and deaf viewers miss nothing. Colour: black text on a white band at the bottom of the screen, which is readable over any drawing; never green text over green leaves. Size: a large plain font such as Arial, big enough to read on a phone, each caption on screen for at least 3 seconds.

(c) All drawings are mine, and the frame 1 photo is one I took. No music, so there is nothing to clear. Credits card: “Made by Cerys Owen, Year 8. Drawings and photo: Cerys Owen. Facts checked with BBC Bitesize KS3 Biology. No music used.”

Term	What it means
photosynthesis	How a plant uses light to make its own food from carbon dioxide and water.
chlorophyll	The green substance in leaves that soaks up the light the plant needs.
stomata	Tiny holes, mostly under a leaf, that let gases in and out.
glucose	A sugar the plant makes, which gives it energy and building material.
respiration	How every living cell gets energy from glucose, day and night.

(b) Before: “The plant used that light energy to turn carbon dioxide and water into glucose.” After: “The plant uses that light energy to turn carbon dioxide and water into glucose.” I changed used to uses so the whole narration stays in the present tense.