About a week ago I was supposed to have an interview with St. Pete. College and I was supposed to give a presentation. I had a marvelous 3 point presentation planned on professionalism in communication. It was going to be a homerun. I had practiced it about 5 times revising the content to make sure it was in the 10 minues alotted. The grandeous presentation had passed all of my expectations, but I hadn't let my wife critique it yet. She came and watched. She gave me a few compliments and then said "What if you tell a story?" At first I was dispondent and quiet because I didn't want to have to start all over, but she was right. A story can convey the same ideas but through some character development and a decent plot, a story has the power to hook listeners in a way even the most awesome 3 point presentation could never rival.
I really liked this assignment because it gave me another chance to practice that skill. I think this is something that instructional designers forget. Teaching modis operandi is give information. Teaching where we spew facts, strategies, numbers and dates is like trying to catch the rain in a cup. Sure you'll get some but alot will still fall on the gound. A story can really focus a person's attention more than a presentation. People are drawn into a good story. A good book sucks our attention. I know I am a whole lot more attentive when a story is being told than when a graphic organizer is being passed out.
I work in an elementary school and have an elementary education degree but I also have a degree in Social Studies and I have not done anything with it since entereing grad school. So I choose a historical topic to do by digital story on.
I first used Power Point to collect and organize my photos and text. From here I reopened it in Keynote. I know that Camtasia allows you to export Power Point to video but I don't have Camtasia and Keynote does the same thing. So on my wonderful MAC, I get the Clip Art resources of Microsoft and the functionality of Keynote. I exported the slideshow to Quicktime. I then imported the video into Final Cut Pro and added a music bed provided by Apple Loops. It took a while to upload to YouTube because of the size.
Viola! Digital Story. Took about an hour once I had conceptualized the project. It's kind of sad but you can watch it below.
Aaron,
ReplyDeleteFirst... wow. That is a very powerful video, and it definetly brings across the information and the emotion that is necessary for a good discussion on the horrors of the Holocaust.
Second, I do think you got the point! I've been struggling to get a concept together to get started and I decided to check out what others have already done to get a bit of inspiration. This is a wonderful example of how to tell a story through technology. It's conceptual, it has a theme, and it flows very well.
I think you are right, we get use to teaching in a straight foward manner that is information based, and we forget the power of a story, and how it can help us relay the same information in a more entretaining and more powerful manner. We as educators need to remember to keep everyone (ourselves and our students) entretained while we are teaching, and digital story telling is a great way to input alot of information into an entretaining format.
Alex S.
You wrote, “A story can convey the same ideas but through some character development and a decent plot, a story has the power to hook listeners in a way even the most awesome 3 point presentation could never rival.” I completely agree with this statement, and I appreciate the way it sums up the importance of storytelling. Storytelling can be very powerful and can be much more effective than just stating information.
ReplyDeleteYou also wrote, “I first used Power Point to collect and organize my photos and text.” This is a good idea. I used Prezi to create my presentation so I didn’t collect my resources anywhere first. I just jumped right in. This was not very successful as I had to pause to find additional information, photos, and media that I wanted to include. I think that regardless of the program you use, it is always a good idea to collect and organize your resources before you begin.
I enjoyed your presentation. Great job imbedding it too!
I absolutely love you Digital Storytelling Presentation! It is provocative enough to evoke discussion on the topic without needing to completely lead students through the whole discussion.
ReplyDelete"A story can convey the same ideas but through some character development and a decent plot, a story has the power to hook listeners in a way even the most awesome 3 point presentation could never rival." Your project does exactly that. I admit, I was hooked into watching it from the beginning. Your use of music and imagery was fantastic! You're able to use a computer in the way that I wish I could. I think I'm going to have to spend more time learning how to make a presentation like that. If I can, then I think I'll have no problem hooking my students into a subject ever again.
Excellent job!