Digital Story-Telling

STUDENT DIGITAL STORY-TELLING PROJECT - Favorite Bible Story

Tuesday, I gave a PD class on Digital Storytelling.  I honestly wasn't sure what Digital Storytelling was - I mean - its bringing the age old tradition of storytelling into the digital age.  Right?  As I began researching, however, I was blown away.  I had NO IDEA there are so many resources.  I began compiling my list which I will definitely share but just in a nutshell,  I can categorize them into four types.

*  Video with Pics, Music, Text and/or Narration
*  Animated Video
*  Flip Book
*  Comic Strip

Almost everything I found online is Free.  Of course they all want you to Upgrade for more features for a price and then some are free for Education - like Animoto.
I don't know everything about each of the web 2.0 tools I found but I gave a short 1 minute demo of all the tools I found and asked the teachers to take notes.  Then, I pledged to them that if they would pick out their favorite one to use in class I would do all of the extensive research and set up the students and write/teach a tutorial.  So far two teachers have responded to my follow-up email.  YES!
I have the following resources I would like to share: 

DIGITAL STORY HANDOUT

Copywrite Resources

Storybook Template 

I think this has been my best class yet this year.  I would love the opportunity to present at TCEA or any other Tech PD Conference.  

Animoto

Yesterday's PD Class was so much fun.  I had 11 teachers come in and learn Animoto.  I have been using it for a couple of years and have found so many uses for it.  The first one I made was All About Me.  I plan on posting that on my About Me Page but since its two years old I have to update it first.

In teaching the class yesterday it was immediately apparent I had a mixed back of participants.  About 1/3 of the class were staff members who were attending for personal use, 1/3 were Primary and Lower School teachers and the other 1/3 were middle school teachers.  So, I just went to my own personal Animoto library and showed them my About Me video, and then I showed them one I made the day after I took my granddaughter to the zoo to duplicate what you could do for a school field trip and then I had some student examples of a book trailer, Washington, DC, and my favorite - a demo of the Alphabet.  I actually got this example directly off the Animoto website.

The students made each letter of the Alphabet out of materials and the teacher took pictures of itr.  The clincher is that the letter A was made out of Acorns, B out of tiny toy Bears, C out of Crayons.... you get the idea.  You just have to see it which you can do by clicking HERE

If you havn't tried Animoto I made a Step-by-Step Tutorial.  Check it out HERE