Digital Storytelling Planning

A big thanks to Cody for letting me share his work on my blog. He did a great job!

Reflecting on the digital storytelling experiences I have recently had in several classrooms, here are a few of the things I’ve learned:

• For the first project keep it simple. Possible strategies include:
  • Select short, basic content, ie a poem/paragraph that the student has written.
  • Use Photostory.
  • Use only copyright-free, free images found online, not any student originals.
  • Don’t require narration.
  • Have students use the music provided in PhotoStory, or don’t require music.
  • If using Windows Movie Maker, use the AutoMovie feature to automate the process.
• Experienced digital storytellers strategies:
  • The student’s content/story can be a longer, more than just a poem, etc.
  • The students can bring in their own images.
  • Use Windows Movie Maker and include video.
  • Include narration.
  • Include copyright-free, free, music downloaded from the Internet.
  • Edit the transitions.
  • Edit the Photostory animation.
  • Create original music using the free site Aviary: Myna.
• Each day tell the students what they are expected to accomplish, referring to a project checklist or a scoring guide.
• During the lesson, display a list of tasks that they are to be completing.
• Using a project checklist or a scoring guide, assess students’ progress every day or two. This could be done during class by checking with students as they work, or by accessing the students’ project folders on the server after class. Students could also reflect on their progress at the end of hour, making notes on the project checklist.
• Students have limited storage space on the server. If they receive messages indicating they are out of space, they may need to delete old files, or move the project folder to a flash drive. (Be sure to copy the project folder, not just the files in it.) It is a good idea to have a couple flash drives available.
• Insist that student stick to using only copyright-free media.
• Bookmark Fusion: Finding Copyright Free Media on all the stations for student use.
• Insist the students create a project folder and store all source files and the project file there.
• If Windows Movie Maker can’t find the source files for the product, right click on a missing file (big red X), and choose Browse for Missing File. Then navigate to the . This typically occurs when sources files aren’t stored in a project folder, or source files are moved after being imported into the project.
• When using Windows Movie Maker, if students do not want to use the audio included with the video and want to record new narration and also include music, they will need to use Audacity. Movie Maker provides only one audio track. So the narration and music will have to combined into one track in Audacity.
• Xtenda machines won’t work with such a project. Windows Movie Maker runs on only one station at a time, and there are not ample USB ports available to plug in head sets.
• Don’t allow students to check out headsets until after the projects due date. Otherwise you have fewer headsets available during class time.

Sample Lesson Outline

Day 1 Project Folder, Images, and Source Document

1. Share an example photostory project.
2. Demonstrate how to create a project folder.
3. Demonstrate how to locate and download copyleft/creative commons licenses images.
4. Discuss aligning images to narration and how many images are needed (illustrate big concepts).
5. Demonstrate how to collect source documentation while downloading media.
6. Students create a project folder, find images, and document sources in a Word document, saving everything to their project folder.

Day 2 Images and Source Document

1. Student continue to find images and document sources.

Day 3 Title Image, Images and Source Document (depending on the length of the written material, more days may be needed to collect images).

1. Demonstrate how to create a title slide in PowerPoint. Save as jpeg instead of a PowerPoint file.
2. Students create title slide in PowerPoint and save and jpg file in project folder.
3. Students finish finding images and documenting sources.

Day 4 Sequence and Edit Images

1. Demonstrate how to import and sequence images into Photostory and some image basic editing features (crop, effects, color adjustments).
2. Students import images, sequence, edit, and add text.

Day 5 Sequence and Edit Images, Rehearse

1. Students finish image editing.
2. Students match narration to individual slides, rehearsing reading.

Day 6 Narration

1. Demonstrate the headset controller for volume and mute. Also show how mic flips down on left to be placed between mouth and nose.
2. Demonstrate how to record narration with headsets.
3. Students will record narration.

Day 7 Music (Depending on the length of the written material, more days may be needed to record narration.)

Supplies: headsets

1. Play 3 videos, each with different music to demonstrate how music overrides images.
2. Demonstrate how to use provided music or import a music file, and set volume for music.
3. Students finish narration and add music.
4. Students create Source slide in Powerpoint, copying text from the Source document, and saving it as jpeg file in project folder. Import the Source image into the project.

Day 8 Finish and Produce

1. Demonstrate how to finish/produce the project.
2. Students will finish and produce project.

Day 9 Share Stories

• This can be done in the classroom with a projector. You will need Windows Media Player 10 installed on the station.
• If you want to allow students to comment digitally on each others’ projects, embed the videos in a blog.

• Embed only 1 video per post.
• Take the class to a lab if you don’t have adequate station access in your classroom. Watch the videos as a class. You can view the videos from the student folders on the server, even though they are available online, to avoid using bandwidth and ensuring that the video plays quickly and smoothly. You should not have students watching videos individually in most cases, because this will use significant bandwidth. Also, all students would then need earbuds/headsets to hear the audio.
• After each video, have students leave a comment on the blog post. A lesson on commenting will result in better feedback.
• It will be a simpler process if students are not required to have accounts in order to leave comments, but yet comments should be moderated before they appear on the blog.
• I would recommend creating a free account at Vimeo to upload the videos. Register for a WordPress.com blog to post the videos and allow moderated comments.

See the Fusion: Digital Storytelling webpage for more resources.

Digital Storytelling

Yesterday while attending the MITC Conference at Lake of the Ozarks I enjoyed listening to Dr. Ohler’s keynote as well as attending his session on New Media Narrative in the Classroom.

Dr. Ohler’s has an extensive collection of digital storytelling resources on his website. Here’s a few of my takeaways:

• Make sure the quality of the story doesn’t get lost in the production. Story Maps are a good start, but using a Visual Portrait of the Story is even better. See also Ken Adams’ Story Spine.
• Music will override images when setting the mood for the story. It is the adjectives and adverbs of the digital story. Choose it carefully.
• The sound quality is greatly improved if a wireless collar microphone is used when capturing video from a distance.
• Creative Commons has added more tabs to it’s search page, including Google Images, which high school students seem to favor.
• Stories should be 2-5 minutes in length.

We currently have several high school teachers working on digital storytelling projects with their students. For their projects, the students are using Creative Commons licensed media, that is media that is not copyright protected, but that is licensed with permission for use. I’ve been bookmarking the Fusion: Finding Copyright Free Media on the students’ stations, as well as modeling locating, downloading, and crediting sources.  The students are creating their own media as well using digital cameras, headsets, and Flip video cameras. We’ve required a  contract signed by both students and parents when checking out any equipment to take home.

We are using Photostory for projects involving just images. This tool is free, easy to use, and automatically adds animation to turn the collection of images, text, narration, and music into a video. The built-in music selection is a big time saver. Most students seems to be able to find an option that work well with their presentations. The recording of narration is easy using the new headsets that we checked out from the library, but can be a bit intimidating for students the first time. For projects involving video, we are using Windows Movie Maker, another free tool. You can see the Fusion: Digital Storytelling webpage for handouts, examples, links to software downloads, templates, etc.

The students have created project folders to store all their media, the project file, a document crediting sources, and the production file. When it’s showtime, the teacher can access a student’s documents folder, open the project folder, and then open the production file to play the story in Windows Media Player. This single file can then be uploaded to a video sharing site, such as Vimeo, and then linked to embedded on a class website.

The story below was created by one of Mrs. Hession’s Child Development students. This class did a great job on their first storytelling project. I appreciate Mrs. Hession’s willingness to take a risk, try something new.

Recently Answered Questions 10-13-09

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How can I use a copy machine to scan a document and email it to someone?

SISK12: How can I print an individual student progress report that lists all the assignment with scores, as well as the current grade?

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SISK12: In my gradebook, how can I view assignments by date, instead of sorted by type?

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My students completed digital storytelling projects with Windows Movie Maker projects on one computer and then logged in on another to show the movie, but it didn’t work. When we try to play the video, it can’t find any of their media.

First, students need to develop the practice of creating a project folder in which they copy all the source files to be used in the project. They should also save their project file in this folder. Once the project is started, you can not move or rename the source files. The concept of a project folder applies to PowerPoint slideshows and Photostory projects as well.

When using flash drives, if a different drive letter is assigned to the flash drive when plugged into a different computer, WMM may not be able to find the source files. This situation can also occur when a teacher logs in to accesses the student’s folder. The path to that student’s folder is different with a teacher log in, as opposed to when the student logs in. You can usually repair the missing file situation by right clicking on each of the missing files and choosing Browse for Missing File.

It is apparent from your question that the students did not complete the movie maker process, did not produce the movie by completing the 3rd step, “Save to my computer.” Had they done so, this single generated file could have been accessed and played with Window Media Player, regardless of where any source files were stored.

I would like to make an overhead or scan a piece of paper so that I could use it in class.  It is silly to make a copy for each child when I only want to use it for 3 or 4 minutes.  I have a hard copy and I know I could use a document camera, but I want to make it so I could come back to it later on in the week for a minute or two…how could I do this?

You can take a picture of it with the document camera. It will store the image on the camera itself. You will be able to pull the image back up to display in the future. Or….you can scan it on the copy machines in the main office, choosing to email it to yourself. This will arrive as a pdf file. You can then store this on your station and display at any time.

My student has a video on her cell phone that she would like to use in a school project. How can we get the video from the phone to a school station?

Many video sharing sites provide an email address to be used to upload videos. If the student has the ability to send emails from his/her phone, he/she could email this video. Vimeo, for example, provides free accounts and is not blocked by the filter. You could set up a class Vimeo account and share the upload email address with your students.  From the Vimeo site you will be able to download the student’s video onto a station.

My students are attempting to sign up for a Google Docs account, but it is requiring a mobile phone number for verification. Is there another way?

Recently Google Docs added this mobile phone number verification to combat spammers. At this time, the help forums offer not suggestions, but do contain complaints from many teachers. We are currently investigating the possibility of using Google Apps for Educators, which may resolve this issue.