My Digital Story

My digital story is about the life lessons I learned from working with horses.  I don't think that many people realize just how much can be learned when a kid engages in some sort of activity.  You hear a lot of stories about how beneficial participating in sports can be, and I will argue that riding horses is a sport.  There is a lot to be learned, especially when you do something for such a long period of time.  I could tell you all about how riding horses helped me when I was learning to drive!  But we'll save that for another time.

I ultimately decided not to change anything in my story.  The main comment I received was to include more music, but I decided against this for two reasons.  Number 1, and most importantly, I couldn't figure out how to overlay my music and my narration.  Whoops.  Secondly, I was afraid the music might distract from what I was saying, and I didn't want that.  Therefore, I stuck to my original cut.

I think that my digital story could probably be an example for all of these things.  I think it could most accurately go with 1 (Raise Awareness) and 3 (Create an alternate stereotype typically portrayed by mainstream media).  For the first one, I'm raising awareness about how important being involved with horses can be, and that many important lessons can be learned.  For the third, I feel like there's this image of little girls with ponies, and that riding horses doesn't require much thought or work.  I don't think a lot of people realize just how hard those who train and ride work every day to make it all look easy.

Digital storytelling is a great way to develop digital media skills because it requires that you think about all those techniques that are used in the media.  How do you want to catch the attention of your audience?  What do you want to say?  How do you want to say it?  You have to consider each of those things while you're working on creating your own digital story, and that can make you more aware of what you're seeing.  It's also helpful getting feedback from others, because you might use a technique (like humor) and not even mean to!

My Rough Digital Story

Storyboard for Digital Story

My Digital Story Storyboard

Infusing Digital and Media Literacy Across the Curriculum

Coming soon.

Brainstorming my Digital Story

1.  Describe a positive scene from childhood.
When I was younger, my aunt was always the one who took me Trick-or-Treating.  At seven, my cousin was born and she started joining us, as did my uncle.  One year, we decided to do a group costume.  My aunt, cousin, and I dressed as the Three Little Pigs.  My uncle was the big bad wolf.  Each time we drove to a new house, my aunt, cousin, and I would get out and run to the door, pounding and begging to be let in.  A couple minutes later, my uncle would show up, doing his "I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house in" thing.  We were a hit, and the people we visited had fun trying to figure out who we were (we wore masks).  With halloween coming up, I thought back on all of the times and memories I have from this night, and this one is probably my favorite.

2.  Describe a negative scene from childhood.
My grandfather had one of those big, old fashioned tractors.  Actually, he had two.  One evening in the summer, my grandfather was getting ready to put the tractor away after plowing the garden.  He would always let me sit on his lap while he drove, and while he was parked in the yard, I ran to climb on.  Except, I climbed up the wrong side.  There was a pipe that stands on the other side, I honestly don't know what it is used for.  While trying to climb up, I grabbed this pipe to pull myself up... and burnt my hand.  It was really hot, and as a result, I got second-degree burns from grabbing it.  I don't remember much about the race to the emergency room or what happened afterwards.  They gave me a cream and wrapped my hand and I went home, but it's a story my family would tell often for years to come.

5.  Identify particular "turning points".
When I was a senior in high school, my grandfather died.  This would be tragic for anyone, but for me it was especially devastating.  Because my father had been absent, and my mother was struggling to provide for us, I had been partially raised by my grandparents.  For five years of my life, I even lived with them.  My grandfather was always a father figure to me, and so him getting sick was the hardest thing I've ever dealt with in my life.  This is a turning point for me in a number of ways.  For one, I learned how my family and I would begin to live without someone who was incredibly important in our lives.  As my grandmother says, we never realized how much he did until he wasn't around any longer to do them.  In another, I found out how strong I could be.  When my grandfather died, I was the one who held it together while everyone else fell apart.  I helped my mom and my grandfather.  I made the necessary phone calls.  It was a lot at the time, especially after the months of taking care of him and the long nights spent sleeping in hospital waiting rooms.  This changed a lot in my life, as it did for my family.

Teaching With Current Events

What is Noteworthy?

There are three purposes for writing news:  to inform, to persuade, and to entertain.  Most of the time, reporters chose what to report based on their position and what will gather an audience.  Tabloid reporters talk about the unbelievable things that celebrities do because it gets them more views on their blogs and sell more magazines. No one wants to believe their favorite celebrity went to rehab, so they buy the magazine to see if it could really be true.  And then, when the star who is known for being a walking disaster cleans up their act, everyone has to read about it.  Local newspapers might report differently on an event then the national media, because they're part of what's going on and understand the situation better, whereas the national media might just want a news story.  Point of view has a lot to do with how and why stories are chosen and reported.

Student Motivation

While students take an active interest in the stories that entertain, they can also be very opinionated on the other things that take place.  Kids are capable of media literacy when given the chance and the instruction, and they take an active role in it.  It's especially motivating when kids are asked what they think about a topic.  One of the lessons I taught that I feel the most proud of was a digital literacy lesson.  It didn't start out that way, but eventually that's the role it took.  Students were engaged and interested, and brought things about what they saw and what they wanted to know that even I didn't.  Interest and motivation can be achieved just by getting them involved.

Authentic Learning

I love how literature can be used to teach about media.  Later books in the Harry Potter series show a lot about how the media can twist the truth to it's own means or to just make an entertaining story.  The Hunger Games is another good example of this, which is a great novel for an area like West Virginia, which is rural and dependent on it's industry.  I liked the point made in this chapter that talked about how younger people have a distrust of the media.  People are becoming much more knowledgable about what the media does and how it might twist a story.

Place-based Education

Sarah Stuteville talked about making stories that connect and inspire.  She also mentioned coming back to her home of Seattle to get support for her and her friend's project, and all of the educational opportunities that are now taking place because of it.  It's easy to create interest and motivation when bringing the place a student knows into the lesson.  It's something familiar, and when they can comment on it and display their own knowledge, it's exciting.

The Seven Elements of Digital Storytelling

video coming soon...