"Digital Storytelling: A Tool for Teaching and Learning in the YouTube Generation" by Oliver Dreon, Richard M. Kerper, and Jon Landis, from the Middle School Journal, explores the importance of digital storytelling, connecting theory and practice with instructional technology, application in the teacher education program, and implications for teachers in all content areas.
The importance of digital storytelling.
"Digital storytelling is the art of combining narrative with digital media such as images, sound, and video to create a short story (Robin, 2008). In the Digital Storytelling Cookbook, Lambert (2006) identifies seven elements that are critical components of effective digital stories:
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While these elements outline the nature of effective digital stories, the process of creating a digital story involves leveraging a wide variety of skills, including researching topics, writing scripts, storyboarding, and assembling the final product using video editing software (Ohler, 2006)" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011). By combining visual images with written text, digital stories can help teachers engage and assess students. Digital stories help enhance and accelerate student comprehension as well as assist struggling readers with a way to envision text and visually communicate meaning. Through digital storytelling, students are required to "leverage a host of cognitive, interpersonal, organizational and technical skills" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011).
Connecting theory and practice with instructional technology.
It is important for teachers to understand the effect that lessons incorporating technologies can have on teaching and learning. Rather than knowing how to use specific technologies in specific ways, it is important to understand how to use pedagogical aspects of technology and how they promote student learning. In other words, rather than focusing solely on movie editing software, examine digital storytelling as an instructional medium and how it could be used in future classrooms.Application in the teacher education program.
"While the instructional technology course helps teacher candidates develop technological skills and an understanding of technology integration, other classes help model sound technology integration in content areas" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011). For example, in a literature course, the instructors in previous years may have taught the instructional method of face-to-face book talks, in which students presented the book they read to the class and tried to convince their classmates to read it. Nowadays, many instructors teach the same concept but in the form of digital book talks. A digital book talk involves working "with tools such as iMovie or Movie Maker to create two-minute trailers for the books students read, similar to movie trailers seen at the cinema" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011). Digital book talks communicate "aspects of theme, plot, character, and setting to tempt the viewer to read the book on which it was based" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011).Implications for teachers in all content areas.
"Making content and connections relevant to students' lives helps bring meaning and purpose to instruction in all content areas" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011). "Digital storytelling connects students to content in ways that they are accustomed to consuming information. Students watch, share, and comment on snippets of videos from TV and movies. They make their own videos and post them to online forums. In fact, the video sharing site YouTube is now serving more than two billion videos per day (Chapman, 2010). The viral video is the cultural currency of today's youth" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011). However, there are some challenges with implementing digital stories into the classroom; "educators using any web-based form of instruction must be concerned about equal access for all learners, taking into consideration an individual's socioeconomic background and learning needs" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011). Although, digital storytelling is not only reserved for student assessment; teachers can use digital storytelling as an instructional method for introducing key concepts and terms. Teaching with digital storytelling "across disciplines requires three interdependent foci—the mechanics of video editing, the techniques of modern storytelling, and the integration of the content and the medium" (Dreon, Kerper & Landis, 2011).My Perspective
Digital storytelling is a new concept for me, and I was curious to read more about this particular instructional technique. This research article delivers the idea of digital storytelling as an important instructional tool which is beneficial in any content area and adjustable to a wide variety of assignments. I thought it was rather interesting that the research article discussed digital storytelling as a viable option for both student assessment and teacher instruction. With how much students are connected to the daily happenings of YouTube, I had never thought of how digital storytelling could be a platform for classroom instruction from a teacher's point of view. The creation of instructional videos which are engaging and appeal to students' interests - similar to popular YouTube videos - would be highly beneficial for students, especially if the teacher creates their own YouTube channel where students could revisit the teacher's videos from the comfort of their own home if they did not fully understand the concept in class. Digital storytelling provides an opportunity for meaningful learning, challenging curriculum, and multiple learning approaches. I believe digital storytelling is a wonderful instructional technique which has untapped potential in the educational world.References
Dreon, O., Kerper, R., & Landis, J. (2011). Digital storytelling: A tool for teaching and learning in the youtube generation. Middle School Journal, 42(5), 4-9. Retrieved from http://www.amle.org/Publications/MiddleSchoolJournal/Articles/May2011/Article3/tabid/2409/Default.aspx
Good share! I too find digital storytelling to be pretty beneficial. I found myself thinking about equal access when writing the lesson idea for my digital story. It would be so much simpler if it was guaranteed that every student would be able to work on their story at home or even after school, but of course that will realistically hardly ever be the case. I suppose in order to cater to student needs, the main bulk of the digital story (the part that is summatively assessed) should fit into class-time work. Students who have time at home or after/before school would be able to have the option of embellishing their digital story too, of course.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing this article - and nice and current! I think I stress so much the needs for students to create digital stories that I forgot about how beneficial it might be for teachers to do the same. Instructional videos can be "easy" and might be powerful tools of instruction in the classroom, especially for online learning situations as well!
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