Thoughts on A Digital Storytelling Project

I enjoyed watching and commenting on the following videos:

Winnie the Pooh (Summary and Advertisement) by Celecta Moss
Messy Room by Sarah Smith and Megan Sorensen
Strawberry Shortcake by Beth Duvall
It's Raining, It's Pouring by Nina Wallace
Winning with Winnie by Amy Dallon
Literacy by Victoria Stokes

I think the most difficult part of creating a digital storytelling project would be the issue of time. Teachers have so much to cover! I think with effective planning and connection to the state core, this issue can be overcome. Working with children of different technological abilities may also be difficult and require special planning. However, this project would let the students' creativity wheels spin. The children would love the final result and treasure it. Plus, the children could improve their technological skills. I think is would be fun and enjoyable learning experience well worth the time spent!

Be Glad Your Nose is on Your Face

The final product of my Digital Storytelling Project:

TPACK

TPACK stands for Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge. The world we live in today makes it crucial for teacher's to have knowledge in all three of the aforementioned areas: technology, pedagogy, and content. Teachers have always needed to have content knowledge; after all, how can you teach what you don't know yourself? Those teachers with pedagogical knowledge know the best ways to teach, so of course they are the better teachers. If a teacher has pedagogical content knowledge, she can teach the content that much better. In a world that is quickly becoming more and more dependent upon technology, teachers now must implement technology in the classroom. This requires technological skills. Not only because great resources are available, but also because students need technological skills to succeed in the world today. However, technology does no good unless it is used appropriately and improves both the pedagogy and the content. Therefore, a quality teacher needs both technological pedagogical and content knowledge.

Storyboard

Knowledge of Internet Communication

The concept of Web 2.0 was new to me--I never realized the great significance of the new forms of communication in the internet. Learning how to create a website was definitely the most useful thing I learned how to do this week. I always thought creating websites was for who knew the language of computers. Now I know otherwise! I love the idea of having a class website or a class blog, depending upon the class I teach. I think websites are great ways to keep parents updated and expound upon students' in-school learning. The link to my website is in my link list.

I also loved learning about video communication. I don't know if I will use it as much, but it is quite fun.
Here is a screen shot of my synchronous video with Celecta, using Google Video Chat:





Here is a screen shot of my asynchronous video, using Facebook messaging:

Technology Background

I have grown up in a technology literate home. My dad graduated from BYU with a computer science degree and works for a computer software company called Oracle. He has stayed updated with technology as a result. Consequently, I have become fairly familiar with computers as well. When I was in high school, my dad installed the operating system Linux on our home computers because he did not like Microsoft's monopoly. It was frustrating at first, but I learned how to use it. I actually use Linux on my laptop. However, I am still familiar with Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint and use them frequently. I am also a fairly fast typer--typing about 77wpm.