About four years ago, there was a great experiment called Penny Arcade: Remix. Strips from the web-comic, Penny Arcade, had their speech bubbles blanked out and subsequently filled by Japanese school-children.
That's long ago enough to rip off, right?
Anyway, one of the jobs I have is head English instructor at a ? juku, or cram school. Basically, kids come in after regular school and use educational DS software, do homework, or take my English lessons. I basically teach out of the public school's Japanese textbooks and do workbook exercises with them. Once we're finished, I round out the hour-and-a-half sessions with word games, origami, and other random stuff I think of.
The aforementioned experiment caught my interest, and I decided to try it with the middle school boys I have on Wednesdays. They're all buddies so I knew they'd have fun working together... plus they can get bored of studying easily.
It worked out well, and they had a lot of fun doing it. It was a little tough, and I'm gonna let them polish up their work next week after studies are over. Still, Penny Arcade's art-style has proved itself once again. The exaggerated motions, facial expressions, and unique style immediately drew the students into the project.
The project used the recent "story-arc" of Gabe's epic fall into the madness that is table-top gaming through the subtle use of a WoW card game. It was a perfect length for a story at twelve panels, with a cohesive visual plot, and it clearly involved a card game... something Japanese kids love and know well.
OK, I've bored you enough with my backstory, so here are the comics:
Original arc:
Cloaked in Twilight
Hot Dogs
The Obliterator
He Who Fights With Nerds
And now the students...
(NOTE: They seemed to find it hilarious that the card looked like Magikarp, so that's what ????? is when written on the card)
Need Money - This guy took one idea and really ran with it...
Lvl 9999999 Magikarp - This student employs a unique form of storytelling, wherein he just fills in random panels.
Two Stones - Where'd that pirate come from?
Liars Everywhere! - I think Tycho is paranoid...
....... - This guy was too busy dicking around to finish and barely filled in anything. Ironic, since he has the neatest handwriting. I'll update this one next week when they finish.
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Now, up in the subject I mentioned you can help. The original experiment definitely had some better results (it was done over two years), but the best thing that came out of this was the students absolutely loved it. The owner had to come over to see what all the excitement was about. Afterwards, he told me he thought it was a great idea, so I certainly have the go-ahead from him. So...
I'm going to keep trying it with other students and with other twists/variations to it. Eventually, I'll start collecting the results on my site Cactus Leaf Translations, which needs an overhaul badly.
How can you help? Well, as perfectly suited to this project as Penny Arcade is, I want to be a little more original. Like I said, put some more spin into it. If you want to help, post a favorite strip of yours, or simply link to it. If it's good enough, I'll edit it, print it, and bring it in for students to mess with. Any comic is OK, because there's a wide variety of students.
One rule: No graphically offensive content (duh)
Offensive language is a-okay because I blank out all the speech bubbles anyway. Just consider these things when submitting a comic:
- Nice sized speech bubbles, or clear indication where text goes[/*:m:1k28ws46]
- Clear, easily understood facial expressions[/*:m:1k28ws46]
- Light colors and backgrounds - can always brighten up using Levels, though[/*:m:1k28ws46]
- Plot that's visually easy to follow and creatively interpret[/*:m:1k28ws46]
- Exaggerated motions and faces are great for humor[/*:m:1k28ws46]
- Large panels, not too crowded or busy[/*:m:1k28ws46]
- NO sex, nudity, partial nudity, visual innuendo, extreme violence -- slapstick is ok[/*:m:1k28ws46]
So, pick out your favorites, post 'em or link 'em, and I'll show the results as they come in.