The New Schoolhouse

Woolly's Gift takes youngsters step by step through the making of fabric for Annie's new dress. Students see Annie and her family shear Wooly, a mother sheep, and wash the wool. They see the wool carded, spun into yarn, dyed and woven, how leftover wool was bartered, and the daily activities of a pioneer girl.

This short documentary film illustrates the various ways people fight the high cost of energy by devising ingenious ways to use wood, the sun, and the wind. The film highlights one such project named the Ark. Using natural systems only, this bio-shelter ingeniously provides housing, heat, food and electricity for an entire family.

For Alexander Galt it was the middle of the road, until he saw some hope for his dream of a united Canada. What was he like, this stubborn idealist? How did he measure up to other political strongmen of his time? In this film you sense the personal clashes and the interplay of political ambitions that left their mark on history.

This short film tells the story of Lord Elgin, a man’s whose faith in a nation’s right to self-determination was stronger than the threat of the mob or his own fear of failure. Successor to Lord Durham, he established the principles on which Canadian government stands today.

This very short animation from the Canada Vignettes series illustrates the hardships of voyageurs' lives in the early Canadian fur trade.

Animated drawings illustrate the life and explorations of Samuel de Champlain, founder of Québec City. The film follows Champlain from his first ambitions to map the New World and discover a passage to the sea, to his later dreams for New France.

Four children see images of other youngsters around the world who dream of doing great things when they grow up but whose dreams are dashed by the harsh reality of their lives. Shocked, the children urgently ask adults to do something. A synthesis of articles 27, 29, 30, 31 and 38 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, this film illustrates children's right to a future. Film without words.

This Colin Low documentary from 1959 depicts Venice in all its splendor. In the tradition of Venetian painter Canaletto, the film captures the great Italian city’s elusive beauty and fabled landscapes, where spired churches and turreted palaces soar into a blue Mediterranean sky. Narration by William Shatner.

In the second installment, "Concrete" explores how, in New York City and globally, residential high-rises and public housing attempted to foster social equality in the 20th century. The film is narrated and directed by Katerina Cizek in collaboration with the New York Times.