Digital stories

Short films produced with low-cost tools on computers, using web-based resources (text, images, audio, video, music)

Samples

Digital video clips for teaching purposes (an example of digital video)

Examples of video sequences prepared by teaching staff in a wide range of trade based areas.

Source Creating Digital Video for teaching purposes, (a LearnScope 2004 Professional Development opportunity at Swinburne TAFE).
URL http://www.vetonline.swin.edu.au/digitalvideo/index.htm
Use These sequences have been designed and produced by a number of VTE teaching staff in the trade based areas. They are designed to meet the needs of the particular curriculum.
Delivery Can be easily delivered to the learners via CD, email, a network drive, the web or integrated into a Learning Management System, such as Moodle, Janisons and BlackBoard.
Customisation Can require specialised skills, depending on the nature of the desired product. Simple video sequences can be rapidly created using a standard digital still camera, many of which can take short video sequences.
Requires: digital video camera or digital still camera that can take short video sequences, digital video editing software, such as Windows Movie Maker (PC) or i-Movie (Mac).
Availability Publically available website

Stories from Queensland Ambulance Services

Examples of digital storytelling sequences prepared by teaching staff in from Queensland Ambulance Service.

Source Stories from Queensland Ambulance Services
URL Go to http://www.groups.edna.edu.au/course/view.php?id=107 then click on Sample Digital Stories then Stories from Queensland Ambulance Services
Use These sequences have been designed and produced by a number of VET teaching staff in the trade based areas. They are designed to meet the needs of the particular curriculum.
Delivery Can be easily delivered to the learners via CD, email, a network drive, the web or integrated into a Learning Management System, such as Moodle, Janisons and BlackBoard.
Customisation Can require specialised skills, depending on the nature of the desired product. Simple video sequences can be rapidly created using a standard digital still camera, many of which can take short video sequences.
Requires: digital video camera or digital still camera that can take short video sequences, digital video editing software, such as Windows Movie Maker (PC) or i-Movie (Mac).
Availability Through the Digital Storytelling Network Edna group.

Collingwood Stories

The stories reflect the changes in the suburb and Australia collectively~ From the initial displacement of original Collingwood residents as the suburb was redeveloped with new roads that cut through old neighbourhoods to the arrival of residents from overseas through various migration waves.

Source Collingwood Stories was a project undertaken in 2006 and 2007 to record on video the life journeys of people who came to live at the Collingwood Housing Estate, Collingwood, Victoria, Australia.
URL http://www.yum.vic.edu.au/cstories/
Use Youth at risk
Delivery Delivered to user via web site
Customisation This site was developed using Flash video, QuickTime Pro (for web streamed video)
Availability Publically available website

True Design: a digital storytelling project

A number of designers from various disciplines participate in a digital storytelling project, which was launched and showcased during Sydney Design 07

Source True Design
URL http://www.dhub.org/articles/966
Use This project offered participants the opportunity to contemplate their design practice through a new medium and to present for the viewer a significant insight into design processes, inspirations and working life.
Delivery Delivered to user via web site.
Customisation Videos on this site cannot be customised. This site was developed using Flash video, QuickTime Pro (for web streamed video)
Availability Publically available website

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Why include digital stories?

Teachers and trainers have long recognised the value of video as a teaching and learning tool. With the wide availability of digital cameras, video projectors, free software for editing and cheap storage media, production of short video products is now accessible for a range of non-specialist or amateur producers, including individual teachers, learners and community groups.

Digital story telling

"Digital story telling" (or DST) is the term that has come to be used for amateur digital video making which has these features:

  • it tells a personal story, usually a first-person narrative of a reflective or biographical nature
  • it combines spoken voice with music to convey mood or emotion
  • it uses still or moving images mostly recorded by the storyteller
  • it is produced on low-cost or free tools which don't require advanced technical skills
  • it is edited on a standard PC using free software
  • it is usually produced for an event or specific audience, rather than as a continuing resource.

In this sense, digital storytelling has been most used in vocational education and training (VET) in Australia as a project activity for learners (students, or teachers themselves in professional development settings) rather than as a source of re-usable learning materials for courses.

Use digital storytelling as learner activity for:

  • projects enabling the integration of a range of literacies — digital, oral and written in English language or adult literacy program
  • projects to re-engage youth
  • developing learner’s communications skills by learning to ask questions, express opinions, construct narratives and write for an audience
  • developing basic computer multimedia skills by using variety of multimedia to tell a story.

Digital stories

The same digital technologies can and are being used to develop learning and presentation materials which don't have the other characteristics of digital storytelling. They are simply a low-cost form of digital video production made possible by the technologies now available on every PC, and the expanding options for distributing the digital products (learning management systems, blogs, mp3 players). Video clips now present a new option for interested individual teachers or trainers who don't have (or don't want) the services of a multi-media unit. They are especially popular in trade subjects to demonstrate processes.

In a vocational training and education (VET) context digital stories are particularly good for capturing workplace experiences. Consider the use of teacher-developed digital stories for:

  • producing engaging instructional material where a personal story is significant
  • using personal experiences to contextualise workplace experiences and new skills
  • documenting work processes for motivated learners — that is, where the presentation quality (and instructional design) is not a critical issue.

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Integrating digital stories

Design steps

Consider the purpose of the video and the needs of the target audience. Often a 'home-made' video, with a strong pedagogical focus is a much more effective teaching tool than something glossy that has been commercially produced.

The design steps for digital video usually include:

  • storyboarding and scripting
    a process of roughing out the subject matter of the clip, often in sketch form (storyboarding techniques)
    Here is a sample story board that can be used.
    Finding the right story requires brainstorming ideas that fit the stories purpose and audience. Mind maps can help explore ideas, organize details, and decide which ones will be used to tell the essence of the story.
  • organising and managing files
    Managing all the files - text, images, sound, music, and final product - is needed to ensure everything is where it needs to be for your project.
    This is particularly important once you begin editing later because most video-editing software references (rather than actually embeds) the media elements for your story. If the media elements are not kept together, the project will need to be re-pointed to the original files.
  • script development
    Establishing the narration (voice over) that provides the "teacher's voice" or the dialogue between characters in the video.
  • digital video recording
    Using either a digital video camera or a digital still camera capable of recording short video sequences (recording techniques)
  • editing
    Joining the video sequences together, using digital video editing tools (editing techniques)
  • presentation
    Determining the most appropriate way(s) to deliver the video to your learners and to integrate it into your delivery (delivery techniques).
  • copyright
    Making sure that the media selected from outside sources is being used legally and ethically.

It is also important in the design process to consider the learner's ability to access the video resources you produce:

  • Digital video files can become large and take a very long time to download, particularly over a dialup connection. Learners wishing to access these resources from home may prefer that they be provided on CD to avoid downloads.
  • Specialised software, (media players), may be required to view the video.
  • Many computer class rooms are not equipped with speakers, so you may need to provide headphone sets.
  • Learners who have either a visual or hearing impairment may be disadvantaged and require the same information provided to them via a different means.

Copyright issues are important if you use images or music or video you find on the internet. The media files you use in your story should be licensed or are shared with permission to re-use; this is the only way you can safely then share your new creation knowing it does not contain any copyrighted material. Finding media assets via Google is not satisfactory. For each media file you find, document the source by title and URL and find a person or organization to use to give credit.

Visit this list of sites to find audio, images and video you can use on your digital stories - http://cogdogroo.wikispaces.com/StoryMedia
You can also purchase images, graphics and video cheaply from a variety of sites that give you the right to distribute media files that contain the assets you have purchased.

Assessment

One opportunity to use digital stories for assessment is for the learners to record their own stories that require learners to research a topic from a particular point of view.

Be considerate of the technical component of digital video and digital story telling production. It may be unreasonable to expect learners to master the technical as well as scripting and storyboarding skills as part of their delivery. A simple way of facilitating this might be to provide learners with access to a digital still camera that records video sequences. Excellent digital stories can be created in this way, using Windows Movie Maker. The learners could then submit this file without having to develop any production skills.

Here is a sample rubric for Digital Story Telling and a more concise Rubric

For a comprehensive guide to Assessing Digital Stories and New Media Narrative Projects visit http://www.jasonohler.com/storytelling/assessment.cfm

Technical notes

Digital video production has a reputation for being difficult to learn and time consuming to produce. This need not be the case.
The advent of affordable digital cameras (digital video cameras and digital still cameras capable of recording short video clips), coupled with increasingly easy to use video editing software, has seen video production become much more accessible. Many home users are now using digital video technologies to edit and produce their own home movies.

Cameras can record video on mini DV tapes (requiring a capture or “recording” to be transferred to your computer via a connecting USB or firewire connection) or straight onto onboard hard drives (enabling quick transfer to your computer through a USB or firewire connection)

  • Start small. Begin by producing very short targetted sequences.
  • Initially, consider recording single sequences using a digital still camera capable of recording short video clips. The files produced can then be distributed without the need to learn any video editing techniques.
  • Choose a video editing tool that matches your level of experience. There are many very sophisticated tools available, such as Adobe Premier, but they are often very difficult to learn to use. Windows Movie Maker (PC) or i-Movie (Mac) are a good starting point for beginners.
  • Similar educational results can often be achieved by synchronising still images with audio. There are a number of tools that facilitate this, including Microsoft Powerpoint and Microsoft Photo Story .

Skills

  • good planning and organisational skills
  • experience with digital cameras
  • confidence to trial different software packages.

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See also

From the Framework

More resources from the Australian Flexible Learning Framework

Tools and resources

There is a wide range of technologies and resources to assist in the production of digital stories.

Social bookmark for this strategy

http://del.icio.us/designelearn/digital_story_telling

Last modified: 11/6/08