Tuesday, March 21, 2006
1:30 PM-5:00 PM
Abstract:
Digital stories are short student-authored digital movies, one to three minutes in length. These digital movies integrate images, text, and sound with a student narration. Digital Storyteller is a web-based digital storytelling toolkit. The Digital Storyteller toolkit is a member of the StoryWeb family, which also includes PrimaryAccess, a social studies web tool for creating digital historical narratives. Digital Storyteller incorporates an integrated text editor for writing story scripts, a narration tool for recording student stories, a web-based digital media editor that supports “Ken Burns-style” pan and zoom capabilities with links to online collections of digital images. Participants in this workshop will have the opportunity to employ a prototype of this tool to create an on-line digital story.
Objectives:
The objective of this workshop is to permit participants to acquire digital images and combine them into an on-line digital story using a web-based digital storytelling program, Digital Storyteller. By completion of the workshop participants should be able to (a) construct web-based digital stories and (b) consider appropriate uses of digital stories in the K-12 curriculum and in teacher education.
1. Participants completing the workshop will receive a Digital Storyteller account for creation of web-based digital stories in the coming year.
2. Participants will receive a copy of the authors’ book, Teaching with Digital Images, and an accompanying CD.
3. Participants will also have the opportunity to join an online digital storytelling community, providing an opportunity to provide feedback on the continued development of the digital storytelling tool, Digital Storyteller.
Optional: Canon will provide digital cameras the morning before the workshop to allow participants to gather local images for inclusion in their digital stories if they wish.
Outline:
The steps described in the authors’ book, Teaching with Digital Images, will be employed as the foundation for the workshop.
1. Acquire Images
(a) As an optional activity, participants will have the opportunity to check out the most recent version of a Canon digital camera designed for school use on the morning before the workshop.
(b) Photographs taken throughout the morning will be added to a Flickr photosharing account and combined with previously acquired images.
2. Analyze
(a) When the workshop begins in the afternoon, previously acquired images will be analyzed and employed as the foundation for a one-page story script.
(b) The script can be written in the Digital Storyteller text editor, or imported from an external word processor.
(c) After analysis, the previously acquired images will be arranged in a sequence accompanying the text.
3. Create
(a) Ken-Burns style “pan and zoom” features will be applied to selected images.
(b) The narration tool will be employed to record the script accompanying the images.
(c) A music track can be added to accompany the narration if desired.
4. Communicate
(a) The completed digital story will be displayed using the Digital Storyteller media player.
(b) The web address (URL) for the story can be mailed to colleagues, who will be able to view the story over the web.
(c) Participants will have the opportunity to join a digital storytelling community, allowing them to continue to discuss ways to employ Digital Storyteller in the classroom and in teacher education, and to provide feedback on its on-going design and evolution.
Prerequisites:
Prerequisites: Participants must bring a laptop with wireless (802.11) capability to the workshop. (2) The laptop (either PC or Macintosh) should have the latest version of Flash player installed (available at no charge at www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer). (3) Participants should also have a Flickr photosharing account. (Flickr is a Web 2.0 service. Accounts are available without charge at www.flickr.com)
The wireless laptop provided by each participant will be used to access the web-based digital storytelling toolkit, Digital Storyteller, that will serve as the foundation of the workshop. Digital stories created with this tool will be linked to images on Flickr, employing a Web 2.0 format to create and display these digital narratives.
Intended Experience Level:
Intermediate
Instructor Qualifications:
Glen Bull is a professor of Instructional Technology in the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. He serves as co-director of the Center for Technology and Teacher Education (www.teacherlink.org). He is a founder and past president of SITE. He currently serves as editor of Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education (www.CITEjournal.org), an online journal published by SITE in partnership with five other teacher educator associations.
Bill Ferster is a pioneer in the development of digital video editing technologies who is currently a graduate fellow in the Center for Technology and Teacher Education. He was recipient of an Emmy award for Outstanding Technical Achievement in 1993 for development of the first digital video nonlinear editing system. Video algorithms incorporated into Digital Storyteller also serve as the basis of commercial tools that he designed which are now employed by all major broadcast networks. These technologies have now been adapted for use in an open-source digital storytelling tool designed for education that serves as the basis of this workshop.
Sara Kajder is an assistant professor of Literacy Education at the University of Louisville and a Network Fellow in the Center for Technology and Teacher Education. She is author of the English / language arts chapter of Teaching with Digital Images. She also is author of the Tech-Savvy English Classroom and the recently published Bringing the Outside In: Visual Ways of Engaging Reluctant Readers. These works explore ways in which emerging technologies such as digital storytelling can be integrated into English and language arts classrooms. She currently serves as associate vice president of the SITE English Education committee.