iMovie Tutorial

Digital Storytelling Questionnaire

AR Reading Post

Article: How to Use Digital Storytelling in Your Classroom by Jennifer New

A brief article discussing seven key concepts to digital storytelling that involve

1)   1. learning by watching (character development, camera framing, what attracts or detracts from movie)

2)   2. Don’t teach about technology, but about the art of telling the story

3)  3.  Learn to be a teacher and a student in the classroom

4)   4. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes

5)   5. Work out assignment requirements

6)   6. Establish boundaries

7)   7. Show their work

Article: Educational Expression:Creating Connections Through Stories by Elena Aguilar

A fantastically inspiring teacher who blogs about various educational topics but has a passion for storytelling and wants to instill that passion within her students. Point of interest to be mentioned:

-Discusses the relationship between telling stories and the interconnectedness that begins to develop from it.

-Continually inspiring students with readings, music, poetry and then asking for their stories.

-The importance of giving students the right tools to create their representations of the life they know.

-Engages students to be honest and forgiving with themselves.

-Introduces their work to the community to provide positive feedback.

Article: Online Opportunity: Documentaries and the Power of the Image by Milton Chen

Focuses on the documentary’s strength in teaching core concepts of visual success. Chen discusses the history lessons learned from watching Remember the Alamo. He also emphasizes the tremendous effect video/the internet will have on the future of education to his conference audiences. The effect already in place that not only affects the resources educators use but also how educators will communicate with each other and the networking that will increase.  Chen cites Union City, NJ as an example of a school that incorporated technology and went from the bottom to the top of the state’s most successful schools.

BP14_Google Presentation3

Here's the presentation I put together in Google Documents.  I love this tool and will be using it extensively for my photography classes!  View it here by clicking the play button or by visiting:
https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dc49nfwp_1g5ks5qf4&interval=5

BP13_Google Presentations2

When I decided on Google presentations, I imagined images and text to show various shooting and photographic techniques that I want my students to become familiar with. As I filtered through the tutorials, ideas began emerging on other rich design elements that can be brought into my presentation to incorporate a more meaningful message—for example, using the drawing tool to create a mind map.  

Google Presentations Drawing Feature

I thought about how much more effective the presentation would be if after introducing the subject, I displayed a map of the key concepts or steps involved in the technique as a way to establish more concise learning outcomes.  The second design element is the addition of video.  

YouTube video and my dog

Presentations should no longer be static, especially in digital photography with the emergence of limitless online tutorials. Google Presentations are linked with YouTube so any video on the site can be incorporated into the presentation. I can’t believe I didn’t do this sooner! So any tutorial I create or video that enhances the lesson can now be a part of it (and in a much more organized way!)  Since my ARP is focused on digital storytelling, I feel as though, with Google presentations, I have a new tool to help me in my journey. 

The third design element that I’ll be incorporating involves animation and a technique called “incremental reveal”.  This feature hit home with me because I find that at the beginning of my discussions I usually ask a question that involves several responses.  It’s a way of beginning a brainstorming session to segue into a topic. With incremental reveal I can have words revealed at different points in the slide for more effect. Students can also think more deeply about their response as certain key words appear on the slide.

Adding animation to presentation

BP12_Google Presentations1

Google Presentation Tutorials on Lynda.com

I decided to learn more about Google presentations.  This is a perfect tool for me because I am always preparing lesson plans and examples to show my students on various photographic techniques. I sit at my computer at night putting my presentation together, then save it to a disk or flash drive in order to take it with me for my class. The google presentation tool eliminates the saving and storage issues and gives me peace of mind that I’ll never forget to take it with me. I’m excited to get started with it.  It's also a tool I'll be using with my ARP.

Woopid only had a 2 minute video and it was more of a generic google docs introduction, so I went right to Lynda.com (thank goodness for Lynda), where I found over 45 minutes devoted just to google presentations. The tutorials are broken down into 3 sections: the basics, working with media and sharing, collaborating and presenting.  I love that they offer templates to choose from—I found it very inspiring as I was learning the tool. What I also love is the “new features” button.  This gives the user the option to see the latest features that have been added to the tool—what a simple and fantastic way to stay current with the software. Google presentations also offers a revision history every time the presentation is saved, so there’s no need to worry about ever deleting a slide by mistake and thinking it’s lost for good.  It reminds me of the layers option in photoshop.  I’ll be back in later posts to report on my progress with google presentations but so far, so good!

BP10_Comment to Teresa

Follow this link to my comments on Teresa's blog.