Digital Stories

1. Digital Stories http://elcstorylab.wikispaces.com

2. Exploring tools and resources • Images: Playdough. an engaging, colorful tool that kids will remember when interacting with the story! • Editing Images: Photoshop • Layout (inserting words and photos):-Powerpoint • Audio: Voice Thread is another option, but we used Movie Maker • Sharing: Utube and Wikisites

3. Defining our target audience • Objective: Help children see stories in a new light. • Target audience: • Fellow Educators • Teachers use any of the story’s forms: printable, viewable, clickable, or audio recording. • Share their reactions and methods. Teachers are inspired to create and share their work in a common location. • LivroAberto • Children read a printed version of the story, possibly including an audio file. • Educators now have a template for creating additional culturally and academically appropriate books. • ELC, Kindergarten, and other students at A through D (Fountas and Pinnell) instructional or recreational reading levels. • Promoting bilingual instruction. • Teachers can create books using sounds the children know. • Children engage in the story experience using a different medium. Can hear the story and have a chance to memorize the story using a medium other than the teacher’s voice. • Cartoneiras can use the book in all of it’s forms to: • Foster a culture of readers by providing open source literature at no cost or low cost. • Spread understanding of Mozambique. • Encourage authors to include health messages in publications.

4. Implementing our lesson plan Audience: 30 children 2-12 years old come to LivroAberto’smobilie libraries once a week for one hour. 30% of the children speak Changaan as a first language. The lessons are conducted in a mixture of Changaan and Portuguese. A cd player has been the only technology used in class. Universal tools: Pointer for bouncing ball activity Emerging Technology Tools: 7 charged laptops (one for 5 students),projector, Traditional Tools: Cardboard books, large vocab cards, big book, picture cards Unit of Inquiry: Feeling weather. Duration: One month. Continuing activity: Introduce the weather following the calendar activity. Day 1: Choose a day after a storm and retell the story orally in Changaan. What do you do when you see sun, rain? I spy game in Changaan. Day 2: Explore a variety of picture cards showing weather- on laptop or printed. Dough activity. Day 3: Project vocab page or display large vocab cards. Charades in Portutuguese. Memorize an active pattern- up to 7 weather actions inspired from the charades. Day 4: Pair children and look at the book without words on laptops or cardboard books. Teach melody for book. Emphasize repetitive phrase: Olheipara o céu. Day 5: Introduce bouncing ball to track words- project or big book. Pair children who are more and less experienced with reading and give them laptops or cardboard books to share.

5. Our product • Our Creation: Clay shapes created by ELC students at AISM illustrate a multimodal, bilingual, fiction reader witha health message. • Our Team: Vanuza, Dani, Ben D., and Sarah • Our Format: • The story can be viewed online simply with text or include audio narration. • This resource is downloadable as a printable storybook to use with or without the voice file. • Our Audience: • We will share the story with ELC students at AISM. • We will post this story on the web and tag our content to help people find our site. • We will share the story with digital and print cartoneiras in Brazil, Portugal, and Mozambique. • We will bring this story to LivroAberto’s mobile libraries and link with their website. • We invite the other educators to post similar projects in a common location.

6. Action Steps/ Questions RaisedHow to… • Create user driven, navigable story (clickable pages) • Upload printable version and plain audio file • Grade Readers • Create tags • Ask other websites to include our link • Encourage other folks to post comments about how they use our tool • Translate to English • Translate to Changaan • Send to Cartoneiras • Include Additional Resources • Possibly with supplementary activities • vocab cards • Theatre ideas • Discussion questions • Possibly with links to higher level activities • Science “experiments” • Global citizenship challenges • Personalize Stories • insert a photo of herself/ her head/ her artwork • Record her voice • Make books for ELC using the sounds they know so far • Upload more contributions.

7. Personal Reflection It’s fun to make five page by cutting and pasting black and white words on a page with kids who create the images. I’ve been thinking about creating a longer story and this class was the perfect opportunity! I sat next to Dani when she was creating the template for this book. I was happy to see that Office 10 gives the option of inserting placeholders! I would like to develop my skills with Photoshop because I would like to be more in control of illustrations for future books that I write! We made a movie, but one of the most important action steps for me is to create a user driven navigable story. Apparently voice thread would be helpful with this, but I have chosen to hold off on using this program until the kinks on the AISM server are resolved! I also would like to upload a variety of forms and files associated with the book that educators could use. As an extension to my idea of studying home literacy is the to research the integration of XO laptops into rural communities or personal readers into international schools.

8. Repeat This! The Generic Process Storyboard • Concept and title • Text • Create text • Grade text • Write Creators’ page • Write health message • Create vocab page • Appreciate sponsor and site sources • Edit first • Translate! • Images • Make images (using playdough) • Photograph images • Manipulate art (in Photoshop) Template (onPowerpoint) • Open slidemaster • Insert placeholders! • Insert page numbers • Leave space for binding • Nudge closer to the outside margins to allow for printer’s margins • Insert text using SigB Print font • Insert artwork Cardboard Book • Print in color or print to color in • Stick inner pages together • Laminate • Cut cardboard a bit longer than A4 • Glue first and last two pages to cardboard using wood glue for durability • Fold A4 into A5 • Staple with “Book Stapler” Movie • “Select” each page and save individually (as jpegs?) • Upload images (to Movie Maker) • Record sound clips (in Movie Maker) Web Space • Create space • Upload documents • Power Point pdf • Movie Maker wmv • Upload video to Utube • Save a video on Utube • Create an embed code • Use Zamzar to remove video and create a stand-alone mp3 file