Throughout history, information has been passed on through the telling of stories and, after the dawn of the digital age, it’s no surprise that these stories have begun to take on digital elements.
Digital storytelling is the practice of using rich media, such as photographs, sound recordings and video clips, to help relate stories. This type of storytelling is really taking off not just because it’s popular with pupils, but also because it’s a simple way of using ICT in the classroom, as a teaching and learning resource across the curriculum.
Learning
The process of producing a digital story has many benefits for children. It teaches them a wide range of skills, including how to analyse text and condense the story into a number of main points. Collaborating with each other to consider the best ways of representing the story using imagery helps pupils build essential teamwork skills. They also have to think critically about the literature, as well as learning to evaluate the digital media they want to incorporate.
The layout and presentation of their projects must be considered too and that really encourages pupils to be creative and take risks, ultimately improving their confidence and independence.
Digital storytelling gets pupils of all abilities involved in lessons and gives them the opportunity to produce some fantastic stories. The process builds on ICT skills and gives pupils the power to save, edit and adapt their work for different audiences, including their peers, parents and the local community.
The digital element of this technique means that digital stories lend themselves particularly well to being used with ePortfolios . Saving and archiving stories is made easy, and they can be uploaded to the school’s learning platform or a site like http://clips.e2bn.org (a sharing website which carefully moderates content). Pupils can build a collection of work that they and their parents can have access to and look back on.
Teaching
Digital storytelling is not just something that pupils can get their teeth into; it also makes for a handy teaching tool. It can be used to introduce a lesson or give instructions; the technology instantly engages pupils and gets them interested in the subject material. Even a short one minute digital story about a poem or historical event will capture their imaginations, get them thinking about the topic and open up discussions.
Kit List
Comic Life
Final Cut Express
Apple iLife '09 (Free with all Macs)