Film education

Since 1978, exceptional short films for children and youth have had a firm place in Oberhausen. Along with  the International Children's and Youth Film Competition curated programmes are shown. In addition to the short film programme, the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen offers workshops and seminars every year for educators, multiplicators as well as for young film enthusiasts and school classes.

School performances for all age groups

The programs of the children's and youth film competition are shown during the festival on weekdays in morning events especially for schools. The programs are carefully tailored to seven age groups from three to sixteen years, both in terms of content and form. All programs are moderated in an age-appropriate manner by members of the selection committee of the children's and youth film competition and the festival team. Filmmakers from all over the world are present during the screenings and answer questions from the young audience. The school screenings last approx. 90 minutes. School classes can register for the screenings from March via kiju(at)kurzfilmtage.de. We are also happy to provide suggestions on how the films can be incorporated into lessons, for example with accompanying material on each programme for preparation and follow-up in class. Get in touch with us.

A boy gesticulates while his team-mate listens to him. Both look over the camera. The festival flags flutter behind them.

Partner school project

Since 2009, the annually changing partner schools have been actively involved in shaping the programmes of the Children's and Youth Cinema. A secondary school and a primary school from Oberhausen nominate groups of schoolchildren who gain insight into the festival through various tasks.

Two juries of five schoolkids each evaluate the films of the Children's and Youth Film Competition and award the prizes. In a joint project week, pupils from both schools develop the trailer for the Children's and Youth Cinema and produce it together with filmmakers/artists from Oberhausen. And last but not least, a group from the secondary school is curating and presenting a programme entitled "Short Takeover", which will be shown at the festival.

If you are interested in working with us as a partner school, please contact us.

A girl and a boy are moderating the programme.

Kindergarten programme

Short films are a wonderful way for the very youngest to get to know the cinema as a place and film as a medium. For more than ten years now, our Festival has been inviting newcomers to the cinema to take part in a film and interactive programme. Age-appropriate short films of various genres are embedded in an accompanying programme of moderation, questions, movement and games. The programme is open to kindergartens as well as private individuals with children aged 3 and older. The visit is free of charge. Please contact us!

Young children in the cinema

Special programmes

In addition to the 7 competition programs for each age group, we also offer changing and recurring special programs for different age groups every year. Two of the recurring programs are the MuVi 14+ programme and the Short Takeover curated by students.

MuVi 14+

In cooperation with the music video competition of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, the festival offers a specially curated programme of music videos for young people aged 14 and older. Whether expressive performances, surreal animations or amazing hybrid forms, music videos in the cinema are a special experience on the big screen and with a good sound system.

Short Takeover

Since 2024, 10 students from our secondary partner school have become curators of their own programme. In the so-called “Short Takeover”, they are given the opportunity to view and select films in a guided workshop and curate them into a programme. The students present and moderate this programme at the festival and discuss with the filmmakers on site.

a student stands in front of the cinema screen and speaks to the audience with a microphone

Film workshop

In cooperation with the filmothek der Jugend NRW e.V. Oberhausen offers a workshop for children and young people aged 12 and older. From brainstorming and script writing to filming and editing - participants learn everything they need to make a professional film. Participation is free of charge, but places are limited.

Five children watching on a tablet to discuss their work with the teacher.

Continuing education for religious education

Organised in cooperation with the secretariat of the German Bishops' Conference: Church and Society of the Protestant Church in the Rhineland and Westphalia, this workshop is aimed at religion teachers in particular. Outstanding contributions from the current Children's and Youth Film Competition are viewed together, analysed and discussed with regard to their use in religious education. Every year, Matthias Film and the Katholisches Filmwerk purchase films for educational work under the title "Edition Kurzfilmtage".

Short film inclusive

Subtitles and sign language

It has become a tradition: Now in its fifth year, all programmes of the Youth Film Competition are equipped with German subtitles for the hearing impaired. The screenings in the 12+, 14+ and 16+ programmes are also accompanied by sign language interpreters on request.

Look closely

Under the titel "Look closely" we offered a shortened programme with fewer films for the Children's and Youth Cinema of the 70th and 71st International Short Film Festival. This is about how films can use different means to convey stories with little or no dialogue. The shortened form of the programme leaves more time to talk about what has been seen. The programme is particularly suitable for classes at federal schools.

Educators

Short films are more suitable for educational work than almost any other genre. They offer starting points for the most diverse topics, for political education as well as for language teaching and not least for film analysis and the development of media competence. This is why Oberhausen has been organising annual conferences for educators in cooperation with various partner insitutions for more than 25 years (German only). Through cooperation with institutions such as Matthias-Film and Katholisches Filmwerk, our Festival is also involved in the distribution of children's short films. There are also screenings especially for school classes.

Teachers in the cinema reading at the screen and listen to the moderator

Continuing education for religious education

Organised in cooperation with the secretariat of the German Bishops' Conference: Church and Society of the Protestant Church in the Rhineland and Westphalia, this workshop is aimed at religion teachers in particular. Outstanding contributions from the current Children's and Youth Film Competition are viewed together, analysed and discussed with regard to their use in religious education. Every year, Matthias Film and the Katholisches Filmwerk purchase films for educational work under the title "Edition Kurzfilmtage".

Trailer 2025

By Lina Walde in collaboration with the children of the partner schools 2025.
Astrid-Lindgren-Schule: Tom Schmidke, Jolyn Seidlitz and Elias Gross
Elsa-Brandström-Gymnasium: Lotta Berning, Grateful Ijeh and Amna Syed

Programme flyer

You can find an overview with all the essential programme information and dates (German only) for the 48th Children's and Youth Cinema of the 71st International Short Film Festival Oberhausen here.

Films and programmes in distribution

We offer both individual films and themed programmes for children and young people via our rental service. We would also be happy to create an individual programme for you. Get in touch with us.

European Children’s Film Association (ECFA)

ECFA is the open network organisation for a wide range of professionals in the field of children and youth film as well as film and media education, based upon sharing knowledge and mutual solidarity among its members. The Festival is a member since 2007 and will host the ECFA Board Meeting during the 65th edition in May in Oberhausen.

Furthermore, the festival has initiated the ECFA Short Film Award in 2017. Each year, a jury nominates a short film shown in Oberhausen for the short list of the ECFA Award.

Previous projects

Trained Eyes

The film education project Trained Eyes ties in with a core area of our Festival’s film education activities: Training the eye, using cinema as a place to show outstanding films, strengthening short film’s special potential and making it accessible for (film) education. Trained Eyes, funded by the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, brings pupils into the cinema and short film into schools.

After the first round of Trained Eyes in the 2022/2023 school year, when five schools from Oberhausen, Bielefeld, Ratingen and Troisdorf participated, the second part of the project took place in the 2023/2024 school year. The concept of the second workshops was changed based on the experience gained in the first round. The focus was not on the intensive study of a single selected short film, but on the compilation of short film programmes by the pupils themselves. The programmes were to be presented to the project participants' classmates in the cinema. So it was the other way round – the pupils became curators, writers, public relations officers and presenters in the screening venue.

Three classes / study groups from the 8th and 9th forms of three Oberhausen schools, comprising a total of 70 pupils, took part. The film selection was largely supplied from our Festival's distribution catalogue and brought together experimental, narrative and documentary formats. More than 650 Oberhausen pupils and teachers watched the three screenings of the resulting 60-minute short film programme.

The participating classes presented their experiences with the project at the Children's and Youth Cinema of the 70th International Short Film Festival Oberhausen.

Shortscreen – Film education online

"Off to the online seminar!" was the motto in 2020 for the young audience of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen.Here they were introduced to exciting perspectives on current topics and looked intensively at details in the cinematic realisation. The online seminar was designed to last about 90 minutes. An offer in cooperation with the filmothek der jugend NRW.

One topic - two films: Hair, hairstyles, beauty - that can keep you pretty busy. What is beauty anyway, are there standards and who sets them? What expectations can one bow to? What limits do you have to find for yourself? In DOLÁPÒ IS FINE and MY HAIR two young black women have to take a special look at these questions.

Seeing the Other

The project Seeing the Other, launched in 2017, explores the potential of short films for political education. Members of the Youth Parliament of Oberhausen view films from the programmes and archive of the Festival, searching for films and themes that occupy and move them. The result is a film programme curated by young people for young people at the interface of politics and (short) film. The participating young people moderated the programme and led the discussion with the audience.

Children's Choice

Children are unbiased and open-minded when it comes to movies. In order to strengthen and preserve this quality, however, they need offers outside their viewing habits. In the Children’s Choice project, which ran from 2011 to 2013, primary school pupils from Oberhausen intensively studied the genre of experimental short films and conducted their own experiments to reflect on what they had seen. The children selected their favourites from the films they watched together and presented them in their own programme during the festival. Children’s choice was sponsored by the BHF-Bank Foundation.

Poetry Clip Competition

From 2011 to 2016, schoolkids from Oberhausen addressed the question "How do I see you?" in the run-up to the Festival. In writing workshops, they developed their own texts on this question in order to convert them into jointly produced poetry clips. The results were filmic insights into the lives of young Oberhausen residents, which were presented and awarded prizes at the festival. The Poetry Clip Competition was launched together with the Peter Ustinov Foundation and was a collaboration between the Festival and Energieversorgung Oberhausen.

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