Digital stroytelling is a wonderful use of UD to assess the depth of student understanding. The idea that storytelling can be accomplished through the use of graphics, videos, audio recordings, and text makes the tool accessible to all students. The use of this technology will create positive experiences for students who may find it challneging to sit still at a desk and write their thoughts out.
Unfortunately, my lack of knowledge regarding the use of digital storytelling hinders my motivation to use it. This is another instance when I wish I had more options regarding professional development. I hope to search for more opportunities to educate myself in the use of technology so that I am more motivated to utilize various resources and support the variety of students I teach.
A couple weeks ago, I felt similarly inspired by the articles for class, but unsure of how to begin using some of the tools in my classroom, mostly because of my lack of technological knowledge. After exploring voicethread in last week's demonstration, I decided to try it with my guided reading groups in class during the rest of the week. Although it was a bit rough getting started, I took pictures of students posing important scenes from the book, uploaded them and had the kids begin to describe what was happening and why the author would have included the scene in the book. After reading the articles for this week, I want to include more targeted reflection questions about the process of posing the scenes and using voicethread for digital storytelling. Since my students have been struggling more with non-fiction, I am hoping this will be a way to have students think about main idea and supporting details with the support of relevant images. Then once student have organized their thoughts, I hope to have them tell the stories they have been reading about, while also taking the time to reflect on their metacognitive and creative processes. Let me know as you find other professional development opportunities for working with technology.
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