Digital Storytelling

Last month, students in MYP4 completed a unit on short stories and how they could be used to show personal growth.  As a final assessment, students were asked to write their own stories, but with a twist: they had to do it digitally.  Here are the instructions they received:

Aim: to demonstrate your understanding of storytelling and what makes a good story.

Task: tell a story from your own life and experience, using multimedia.  You may include photos, animation, film clips, text, voiceovers, or anything else you deem appropriate.  You will have two days to work on it in class.  Follow these steps:

1. Go back to your ideas of funny stories or a time you learned something.  Choose one from each list that you think might be a good story to tell.
2. With a partner, discuss your stories and decide which one would be the better choice.
3. In your notebooks, make some notes about the plot of your story:
   • Exposition (intro)
   • Inciting Incident (event that starts the story)
   • Rising action (things that happen)
   • Climax (high point of your story, where things come to a head)
   • Falling action (final events)
   • Resolution (wrap-up)
4. For homework, see if you can find photos or other “artifacts” that might be useful in telling your story.
5. Storyboard your ideas.  (This will take place on Day 2 in class.  I will explain.)
6. Create your digital story using whatever platform you find appropriate: iMovie, Google slides, etc.  Just be sure you can share it with me.

Grading: You will be graded on Criteria B, C, and D.

Tips:

• Your story should be 80% content and only 20 % video, sound effects, etc.  Be sure to tell your story, not just flash a bunch of photos and noises.
• You’re not technically being graded on your ability as a storyteller; I am looking at how you can organize your ideas and produce appropriate text.

Not everybody went “full digital,” choosing instead to do PDFs or even drawings, but there were some very creative ideas.  Here are a few examples: