Module 2: Digital Story

          When the assignment, to create a digital story, was first told, I had no idea what I would be doing nor how I would connect a learning standard to my life. I felt like I hit a brick wall at first because of being unsure how I could possibly take a standard put it into a lesson that in some way is a part of my life. I then realized that it could be possible if I opened up to this idea and allow my creativity to show.

          The first day we looked at a few examples of digital stories others have created to show students how they could make their own story. From there, the class had to pick an Illinois State Learning Standard that could be used in our personal lives. I realized that choosing a standard was not as hard but creating some type of lesson had a few bumps in the road. Before starting the digital video, each student had to create a concept map using popplet or bubbl.us to plan out their story. After finishing the concept map, the digital story could then be made. In making the digital story, we used the website wevideo.com. On this website, there are a variety of options to create our stories. With the free subscription, we were allowed to use some soundtracks, backgrounds, frames, et cetera, that were provided by the website. Each student was allowed to put multiple audios, videos, and even sound effects to make their unique videos. Many students searched for pictures and music in the public domain but each had to make sure they understood what could be used with respect to copyrights.

          As I was making my own digital story about Spanish, I learned a great amount. First, I learned even more about copyrighting. The previous knowledge I had about copyrighting was that any information found on the web, newspaper, book, and so on, must be cited to give the person credit for what they have wrote. While working on this assignment, I learned that when teaching, we are not allowed to show videos or movies unless it is for educational purposes. I also learned about what the Ken Burns effect is for I was not aware of it before working on my digital story. The Ken Burns effect involve moving on a picture by zooming in, out, or toward the side to give the photo more meaning and interest.

          In the end, working on my digital story was an adventure in which I had to learn more of technology in creating a video which I never really did much before this assignment. Making this digital story on wevideo.com allowed me to be more comfortable in experimenting new ways of using technology that I never thought of before. I could use this in my future vocation as an elementary teacher by allowing the students to create their own story to share to the class. It would be a great exercise to allow students to share something important to them that other may not know. Not only this but, using digital stories will be a great way to make lessons for the students in a creative way.

Module 1

In a classroom, there are a variety of ways students could be taught from lecturing to activities. A teacher must understand that each student has their own learning method that we must take account to. It is easy for a teacher to fall in the ways of teaching through lectures and Power Points since it may be the simple way to teach. Instead of teaching with lectures to the class each day, teachers must be creative and take risks so each child may have an advantage to learn and allows the class to be engaging.

One method that can be used to encourage engagement would be the jigsaw activity. The jigsaw activity is a way for students to take part actively in a lesson. Each student is essential for the lesson in which they have to teach their peers about a topic they have. Students each given a topic they must research and take notes on. In the following class, they meet with other peers who have the same topic and get together to see what they all found in common and facts they might have missed. Once this is done, the students are then put into other groups with different topics and each one will take their turn in teaching their classmates about what they have learned. In the end, students needed to work together, be attentive, and engaged to understand the new information they were given by their groups.

In Educ 209, we used this activity to learn about at least three different websites to make online videos which we could for our introductory videos. We each were put into groups to then share what we have learned about the website we were given. This was a great way to learn in the class because it was hands on rather than sitting, listening, and writing information down. With the experience I had, this activity allowed me to teach my classmates about the website and allowed me to be comfortable and confident with what I have learned and taught. As well as teaching, I was able to speak with others I may not normally speak to on a daily basis.

I have seen and done this jigsaw activity before when I was younger but not with the exact same steps. In a few of my English classes, we would do small groups and interact with one another on what we have learned and ask questions to each other on what we might have not completely understand and then receive feedback. In the future, I will implement this activity into my lessons to allow my class to learn from each other and enjoy learning.