Digital Pictures Speak

Digital Storytelling Links | Samples of Digital Storytelling | Articles | Books

Digital Storytelling Links

The Art of Digital Storytelling
http://www.techlearning.com/digitalmedia/

You need to register (no charge) to read this e-book which is an excellent resource. It provides links to many examples done by students of all ages.

The Story Center
http://www.storycenter.org

This site has a “cookbook” for  digital storytelling.

Learn about the 7 elements of digital stories
Storyboarding
Digitizing memories

“Storytelling with images means consciously economizing language in relationship to the narrative that is provided by the juxtaposition of images. There are two tracks of meaning, the visual and the auditory, and we need to think about the degree of closure each provides in relation to the other.”

Digital Storytelling Finds its Place in the Classroom
http://www.infotoday.com/MMSchools/jan02/banaszewski.htm

Learn about the Place Project done with fourth and fifth grade students. This article focuses on how digital storytelling hooked children (grade 4) onto writing. It provides the step-by-step process the author used.

Mark Standley
http://www.mstandley.com/index.html

Mark Standley is a strong proponent of digital storytelling. He has organized a film festival in Alaska, the IdidaMovie Festival, where students could enter and share their stories. You will find some papers written by Mark Standley outlining some of his ideas.

He has also published several books with CD-ROM support: Digital Storytelling with iMovie and Digital Storytelling with Powerpoint

Digi Tales
http://www.digitales.us/

"A story should be remembered for its soul, not the bells and whistles."  Bernajean Porter
This site is an excellent source of examples, information about tools for digital storytelling as well as some ideas about evaluation of students' work.

Shout Out! A Kid's Guide to Recording Stories
http://www.transom.org/tools/basics/200501.shoutout.web.pdf

This is a guide you can download for students who want to gather audio stories. It works through the steps from selecting a subject to interview, how to conduct the interview and how to use the equipment. Although this site deals only with sound recording, many of the tips can be applied to video recording.

These Stories in Pictures:
an easy guide to storytelling from the images we collect in our lives
http://www.storycenter.org/canada/index.html

The site concentrates on personal narrative, but there are many good tips to creating powerful story

Digital Storytelling
http://electronicportfolios.com/digistory/index.html

Dr. Helen Barrett looks at ePortfolio as the story of learning. Explore some of the links she recommends here.

What’s Your Story?
http://www.fastcompany.com/online/21/rftf.html

This article, by Daniel Pink, describes how the business world uses story in its work.

Telling Tales with Technology
http://www.techlearning.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=60300276

This article appeared the the February 2005 issue of Technology and Learning. It describes a variety of projects which have taken place across the U.S

Photojournalism
http://nlford.com/essay.htm

A photojournalist uses her photographs to illustrate an essay on photojournalism. The author brings an interesting perspective to the effect of powerful images. The site would be a good discussion point for older students, before they take photographs for a digital story (or photo essay).

Digitally Enhanced Oral Storytelling
http://www.jasonohler.com/projects/deost.cfm

Enhance oral stories using chroma key editing to use images as a backdrop to the storyteller. The site takes you step-by-step through the oral storytelling process as well as through the technical aspects of the project.

Samples of Digital Storytelling

Photo Romans

http://www.csdm.qc.ca/st-gregoire/Projets/troisieme-cycle/photo-roman.htm

View some student made Photo Romans. You can view these with your browser. (in French)

Other Digital Stories

The Memories and the Dreams
Laurier Macdonald High School Media Education
http://www.emsb.qc.ca/lauriermac/rodweb/memodreamsstories.html

Still images and text combine to make powerful stories. This web site also has links to sites relevant to the story.

An Immigrant’s Journey
http://education.apple.com/education/ilife/project_template.php?project_id=105&subject_id=1

From the Apple iLife site: Eighth grade students from Lincolnshire, Illinois wrote journal entries for a fictional, yet historically-accurate, immigrant in 1907, and then made a movie using narration, music, and photographs. This resulted in a powerful rendering of the immigration experience.

SFETT
http://www.sfett.com/
Marco Torres has worked with his students on both digital stories and other film genres. He and his students put on an annual film festival. There are some extraordinary examples here.

Historica Minutes
http://www.histori.ca/minutes/default.do

Historica Minutes use a combination of moving images and photographs. There are samples of student made minutes, as well.

Digital Storytelling in the Scott County Schools
Georgetown, Kentucky
http://www.scott.k12.ky.us/technology/digitalstorytelling/ds.html

One school district worked extensively on digital story. Here you can get information and view the stories from a variety of students and faculty

Pier 21
http://www.pier21.ca/Online_Story_List.2875.0.html

Pier 21 (now a museum) in Halifax, was the entry point for many immigrants to Canada. You can find some interesting examples of combining artifacts with stories (not all stories include images)

Capturing Wales
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/capturewales/

“BBC Wales is working with digital storyteller Daniel Meadows from the Centre for Journalism Studies at Cardiff University. We run monthly workshops around Wales, working with members of the public to help them create their own digital stories.”

This site is of particular interest to teachers of end of Secondary students as well as adult learners.

KQED Digital Storytelling Initiative
http://dsi.kqed.org/index.php/contest/

Have a look at the contest winners to see the use of still images (sometimes drawings), text and music to create powerful stories of the people who moved to California.

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Articles

Digital Storytelling and Flickr: An Entry Level Project
http://competitivevoice.blogspot.com/2006/03/digital-storytelling-and-flickr-entry.html
David Jakes describes a powerful project done in a high school health class.

Communicating Visually in the 21st Century
http://jakespeak.blogspot.com/2007/01/communitcating-visually-in-21st-century.html
David Jakes talks about why teaching visual communication is essential.

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Books

Rainbow of dreams: Memories in black and white : an anthology of restored photographs and writings by media students at Laurier Macdonald High School

This exceptional book was done by students. Their response to the personal family photographs resulted in powerful, authentic writing. The book includes information for teachers on how to implement a similar project.