Digital Storytelling with Chris Toy @ BTG09

21 11 2009

Chris Toy was a presenter at our school’s annual BTG conference. He presented on digital storytelling. What’s digital storytelling? View this video and then continue to read my notes on his presentation below.

Title: The First Pedagogy and the 21st Century

  • Why tell a story?

Goals for this session:

  1. Model sharing of stories
  2. Reflect on why digital storytelling is engaging to an audience
  3. Transfer activities to classroom practice
  • Change and Leadership: How will you prepare yourself and your school for the 21st century? “You must be the change you see want to see in the world.” (Gandhi) – What do you want from a child? What situations will you put your students in? What choices will you offer your students? How will you empower your students? What sustenance will you provide?
  • Digital Storytelling is a rich and deep teaching medium
  • If you had to use a story in your classroom in the next month, how would you adapt it to your use? This is the most challenging aspect for teachers.
  • Teachers need to make it relevant to themselves and their students
  • An intro video example on digital storytelling from this Educational Uses of Digital Stories site
  • Students become more engaged and learning is more meaningful – ask them to interact within curriculum – Students will become the curriculum
  • Another form of storytelling is music (ex. Billy Joel “We Didn’t Start the Fire”- social comment from 1949-1989)
  • Business student parody “We Didn’t Start the Crisis”
  • Example story of “How Paul Bunyan became a Champion” (photos taken from Creative Commons)
  • (C.Toy always stops before the end of the story and asks the audience to predict the ending in pairs – He then asks a reflection question related to the story)
  • Point of View story example from elementary students on The 3 Little Pigs (example was a narrated photo slideshow – some stop motion animation applied with photos – some YouTube examples here)
  • What are some things or practices that are made of straw, sticks and bricks in our classrooms and schools? (Reflection question related to story)
  • Musical Stories are another possibility: Social studies example
  • How might you use music to reach and teach more students?
  • Chris Toy then concluded with some stories about student work regarding problem/project/challenged based learning
  • He used these videos: Elem example, HS example
  • What can you share about your school’s initiatives through Digital Storytelling?
  • Poetry and the Parable: Blind Man & Elephant example using simply Keynote style

Go here if you need further info regarding the use of video in the classroom. The site offers student examples, lesson ideas and rubrics. I also have some film and video lesson ideas here on my wiki too that may be of interest. But the mother of all ideas may come from Alan Levine’s 50+ Web 2.0 Ways To Tell a Story.




Curiosities & Roadside Attractions

23 10 2009

10 Killer Content Sources for Your iPod Learning Mix (via Mission To Learn)

Improve Your Browsing Sessions with SuggestRSS (via WebAppStorm)

More Challenges with Wikis: 4 ways to move students from passive to active (via The Journal)

Have a look at Matthew Needleman’s Video In The Classroom (Digital Storytelling in the Elementary Grades and Beyond) site to view student films, film techniques, tutorials, tips and rubrics.

A Missing Piece in the Economic Stimulus: Hobbling Arts Hobbles Innovation - an excellent article on why art education matters and how it leads to innovations in other areas. (from Psychology Today via Journeys in Art)

The 3 Best Sites To Read Manga Online (via Daniel Pink on Twitter)




Curiosities & Roadside Attractions

11 09 2009

From the web:

Back to School: 10 Terrific Web Apps for Teachers (via Mashable)

Aardvark: Need a fast answer from someone who knows what they’re talking about? Aardvark discovers the perfect person to help with any question in minutes.

Storybird: Collaborative storytelling for families and friends

TuxPaint is a free drawing program for children ages 3 to 12 (for example, key stages 1 and 2). It combines an easy-to-use interface, fun sound effects, and an encouraging cartoon mascot who guides children as they use the program.

ToonDo

toon do




Little Red Riding Hood reinterpreted

30 03 2009

Tomas Nilsson created this interpretation of Little Red Riding Hood for a school assignment. (That’s all I really know)


Slagsmålsklubben – Sponsored by destiny from Tomas Nilsson on Vimeo.




From the Holiday Trenches

29 03 2009

I couldn’t help it. I know I am on holiday. I promised myself not to use a computer. Having drafts available was just too tempting.

Here are some articles that may be of interest.

Data Visualization Is Reinventing Online Storytelling
Today’s consumer seems to have an insatiable appetite for information, but until recently making sense of all of that raw data was too daunting for most. Enter the new “visual scientists” who are turning bits and bytes of data — once purely the domain of mathematicians and coders — into stories for our digital age. 

Is Facebook Growing Up Too Fast?

Wikipedia: Exploring Fact City
“Contributors to Wikipedia have wondered aloud lately if — perish the thought — they are running out of topics.”

And have a look at SearchCube. It is a “…visual search engine that presents web search results in a unique, three-dimensional cube interface. It shows previews of up to ninety-six websites, videos and images.”

 
 




Storytelling

9 01 2009

Lurid.com has an all-new series with acclaimed illustrator P. Craig Russell discussing graphic storytelling and sequential art. In the debut installment, he looks at the opening page of his comics adaptation of Pelléas & Mélisande. Check back for a new segment every Monday!

There is also a lesson plan here from the Apple Learning Interchange site on retelling stories.

It is described as:

When students retell a book, their words are captured in Comic Life. In a guided reading group setting I want students to be able to reflect on and see their retell in a tangible way. Typing the retell words a child says into a Comic Life document helps them see their thoughts and reflect on them. It gives the teacher the opportunity to revisit what they said, to notice their strengths in the retell and point out and train the student in the areas where they are weaker. The Comic Life retell is sent home with the student so the child’s parent can be informed of the retell skills their child focused on that day and to continue practicing those skills at home.

I use ComicLife all the time with my elementary students. Have a look. There is more to do than the above.




Ideas First, Tools Second

12 12 2008

Recently, grade 1s at my school were inquiring about transportation. They have just finished this unit. The reason I am writing is because the teachers gave the students choice on how to present. This provided a much more interesting form for assessment and was an excellent vehicle for creativity. Students needed to examine and share what a transportation system needs and how it works etc., regardless of how they presented. Some chose plastercine models, some drew large illustrations, some drew their work via computer and some created slideshows within KidPix. Students were motivated and engaged during the tasks as it possessed a stronger connection to themselves and offered differentiation. When complete, students then planned a field trip to a local area and discussed how they could get there with the knowledge they gathered. Parents were also invited into the class to view the work.

Our grade 2s were examining retelling stories. Some chose to record audiobooks using GarageBand. The group below rewrote a popular story, recorded it and added sound effects. They then used the mp3 as the soundtrack for their shadow puppet performance. Watch below or click here. The point is, the teachers discussed the ideas and outcomes first, and then decided on the tools alongside the students. Make the technology fit you, instead of vice versa