Sunday, June 28, 2015

Digital Storytelling

This entry is a travelogue of my journey into bringing my students and myself into digital storytelling. I wanted to do something different from business-as-usual with my summer classes.  I had six four-hour sessions with my level 2 (low intermediate) class and four four-hour sessions with my level 3 (high intermediate) class in which to accomplish something fun and practical. Would that be enough time for them to complete their projects?  In actuality, it was more than enough time.  Both classes finished early and we had time to finish the summer semester with The Red Balloon.  ESL students never cease to amaze me with their willingness to jump into any project I put before them, and as usual, they came through with flying colors with this one.

Why digital storytelling? First, I constantly encourage my students to visualize what they read.  Can you see that in your mind? What does it look like?  With digital storytelling, they have to actually match images with narration. I also wanted to improve their computer literacy, which I'm seeing more and more as an obligation in today's digital world.  Third, the digital story would be their story, on a topic with which they are familiar. Most chose personal stories about family members or events, but one student created a fictional love story and another wrote about Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera.

The digital storytelling project may have been more of a challenge for me than for them.  I had to learn PC! I have been a Mac user since I bought and became enamored with my first Mac in the 1980s.  I do own a PC laptop now, with which I have a tenuous relationship, using it when I have to, but definitely preferring my MacBook Pro.  But in the real world, my community college computer lab is populated with Dell computers, and the laptops available at my other teaching location are IBM Thinkpads.  I knew iMovie, but now I had to learn a PC-available app for my summer project.

I found examples and tutorials for creating digital stories via various free apps for PCs: Photo Story, WeVideo, Windows MovieMaker, and Windows MovieMaker 2012.  I decided to go with MovieMaker 2012.  The available computers for my classes had the requisite System 7 installed, so all I had to do was talk the IT powers-that-be in each location into installing MovieMaker 2012 on the computers. Then I began my homework, made a manual/handout lush with screenshots, prepared storyboard handouts, and launched the project, beginning with paper-and-pencil work:

  1. Write and revise your story.
  2. Mark locations in your story where you will use pictures.
  3. Rewrite your story on a storyboard or story table (from Jason Ohler, 2010), showing exactly which picture will go with each part of the narration.
At this point, I gave students the manual/handout and introduced them to the computers.  Fortunately, each class had at least one student who was computer-savvy and was willing to help the novices.  As students finished their stories, I asked them to help others who were still working on theirs. My level 2 students finished in four days; level 3 in two.

When the stories were finished, I compiled them into a continuous movie (using iMovie), which I gave to students on a DVD, along with their individual story. Digital storytelling is a journey I will take again with my ESL students. The video below comprises the stories of my level 2 students.