Digital Storytelling

So, I've been perusing the sites Sandy posted for us and as I look at examples of what middle school kids have done, I'm blown away. To create the script and develop such sophisticated editing skills...wow!

Check out these kids: Mabry Film Fesitval 2007

Kerpoof is a website I remember Gail letting the students work with this past year. I do know they absolutely LOVE the idea of animating their own stories/movies. Even in their spare time, the children were flocking to one of the downloaded programs on my desktops (I can't remember the name of it) over and over again. Although they created nothing specific, they loved playing around with it. Kerpoof is far "cuter" in my opinion and very intuitive. I'm almost ready to say goodbye to Kidpix after playing around with it.

In fact, while I'm talking about animation, this site cracked me up: Build Yourself Wild. I had a lot of fun goofing off with that. I also loved Saatchi, This is Sand, and Snowflake Maker.

Back to Kerpoof. Soooo, while I love the technological aspect of the program, I remind myself that I work with young children. The novelty of such a fun program is exciting, but it requires "work" to master...and time. I realize the children LOVE them, but I struggle with how to make something THAT fun as academic as I'd like. It's the same argument I posted yesterday: the thrill of these programs would frequently prove to inhibit their progress, rather than develop it.

Working with such young children should not exempt them from exploring such exciting programs, but when instructing such young children, I can't ignore that learning how to work through a new program has to take place before I can expect them to use it as a tool for learning. Even the silly marker boards can prove to be a distraction in that sense! I have to let them "play" for 5-10 minutes now and then so that the "fun" wears off (so-to-speak) and they can focus on the math problem at hand.

To my benefit, Gail Driscoll is a wonderful resource because she often lets the students "play" with a new program before I ask them to use it in a project for assessment. So, let me get with her about kerpoof...I'm sure we can work out something fun for them!

I used Animoto with my son this past spring to make an "at home" surprise project. Every child in his class was allowed to take the class stuffed animal, Piggy, home for a week. I was looking into Animoto at the time and decided to try it out. I've tried to post it here, but it's not working. Maybe it's because the video is so old.

I wasn't sure how to use Animoto with my class, as I hadn't figured out how to record onto the program, but it definitely has potential. It looks so professional when completed. Because the animations are not really up to the students to design, it makes putting the finished project together rather easy.

I also visited XtraNormal, even though it is definitely meant for an older audience. There are such clever people out there! And by the way...I didn't create this clip! I just borrowed it!