I wanted to include scenes of distraction, thinking time, frustration and eventual commitment to putting words on paper/computer. I also wanted to use scenes with my cats to portray distraction. During a lesson on uploading U-Tube videos, I was inspired to use video clips to portray the actual writing and revising processes. So I developed a two part approach for my video. Using scenes from my home, the library, the English computer lab and shots of the quad, I produced Part I, a narrative description of my process ending with the commitment to begin. In Part II, I used video clips of cat antics from U-Tube to depict the writing, editing, and revision process.

I really enjoyed editing and adding features to the video. This was a skill I had long wanted to learn, and how better to learn it than playing with a project like this. I was enthralled with the basic skill of splitting a clip as it brought so many future possibilities with it. Learning how to download music, add, move, change volume, speed, and many special effects, such as aging the film, putting in rain, sound effects, repeating and many more, was just icing on the cake. As the description of our demonstration emphasized, we were to learn approaches, not just discrete lessons. This was also the case with this project, with all the technology we learned. These are skills that are now ours and can be used in infinitely different ways. As Gail reminded us, teaching a man to fish goes a lot further than giving a man a fish.

Engaging reluctant writers is essential. Utilizing technology, such as digital storytelling, within writing projects can hook some reluctant writers. Students can utilize writing skills in digital storytelling via narration, dialogue, scene setting, story core, story mapping, scripting and storyboarding as well as visual portraits of stories. The creation of a unique video is itself a form of writing. Working in writing teams encourages differentiation and active participation by all.

In my demonstration, students created a short (2-5 minute) video demonstrating appropriate social interactions. They followed the steps below, but were encouraged to adapt these directions to their interests/experience.

1. Break into groups and choose roles such as producer, narrator, actors, script writers,
storyboard author, oral storyteller(s)
2. Use one of the suggested scenarios or create your own.
3. Discuss how you want your character(s) to solve their problem or to use pro-social skills to improve their lot in life.
4. Have one or two members tell the story to the team and revise as needed.
5. Create a storyboard for your video.
6. Tape your video following your storyboard.
7. Make a quick iMovie.

My talented classmates created marvelous videos. These were planned, taped and created in iMovie within 40 minutes. Jason Ohler noted in his book, Digitial Storytelling in the Classroom, that the rough creation of digital stories takes about 20% of the time for the project and the last 80% is polishing. Depending on the purpose, he advocates less polishing in a classroom setting in order to provide more practice with the actual digital story making.

Reflection on my Demonstration

In planning for my demonstration lesson, I was not lacking for ideas. I wanted to integrate social/emotional learning skills in some manner utilizing technology skills. Charlie, my very patient and wise coach, guided me to the ReadWriteThink lessons plans on the NCTE web site. Lessons on bullying, setting up classroom expectations, building classroom community through poetry, and using comparing and contrasting skills to interpret themes of liberation and racism in texts all peaked my interest. However, I was also reading Digital Storytelling in the Classroom by Jason Ohler and was hooked. I really wanted to present a lesson on making digital stories related to social skills. Charlie helped keep me on track as I had initially spent way too much time on researching and getting resources for social/emotional learning skills. I really wanted to make the point that, like writing and technology, social skills permeate everything at school and therefore need to be directly addressed throughout the curriculum. I needed to remember that this was first and foremost a literacy lesson. So I decided to create a lesson to teach students how to quickly create a digital story… specifically on social skills. I regularly use video taping with some students, but had never considered having them write the script, choose the action, devise the scene, and tape it themselves. There was a wealth of storyboard examples on the internet and no two were quite the same, although there were basic similarities. I chose three samples to demonstrate how storyboards can be used and also found parts of two commercially made DVDs showing students using appropriate social skills to solve problems in order to give my peers examples of videos, albeit professionally made ones. As previously mentioned, I had my “students” choose a challenging social situation for which they could model appropriate social skills, decide just how to handle this situation, come up with a group consensus on how to create the video, produce a storyboard, tape the video, and download it onto iMovie, all within forty minutes. My talented classmates exceeded my expectations for creativity and invention. It was great fun as well as an important learning experience.

The written responses to my demonstration included good points and some interesting suggestions. They all agreed that this would likely be quite motivating for students with a potential high degree of engagement. Possible drawbacks frequently mentioned, as well as discussed at the end of the demonstration, were time and experience with technology. In an actual school environment, it would be important to have some students experienced in videotaping and downloading. We talked about training a student cadre of technicians to help with the technology part. In my social work setting, I have many older students who would enjoy this and who could benefit from this “expert” role. I would likely do the training over lunch periods which could also be fun for these students. I would like to eventually expand the number of expert students. And my hunch is that this will come a lot easier to our digital native students than it did for us digital immigrant teachers. As was emphasized, a polished look was not the goal for this video. Getting a quick rough “first draft” was the goal – not adding sound, voice-over, and other fun, but time-consuming trappings. Unlike how independently our “students” in this demonstration worked, students at my elementary school would require longer time and more guidance and assistance during each step. And the reality is that the taping would only be done in my or another teacher’s presence.

My peers commented that this type of activity could be used across other subject areas – history, science, math… They also noted that students need to use social skills in order to collaborate to create this video on social skills and that social/emotional skills are needed across the curriculum throughout the day. By having students create this type of short video, they experience working as a team, compromising, and taking each others’ perspective. Additionally, they practice describing, role playing and acting out appropriate social skills. By “teaching” these social skills for others to view, hopefully students will “own” these skills. Social/emotional standards (Develop self-awareness and self-management skills to achieve school and life success. Use social-awareness and interpersonal skills to establish and maintain positive relationships. Demonstrate decision-making skills and responsible behaviors in personal, school, and community contexts.) are important life skills that are vital in school and in the future workplace. This project addressed writing, technology and social/emotional standards.

Our Summer Institute was composed of some of the most creative, talented, humorous and persistent teachers I have ever met. All of us presented a demonstration of an approach to teaching writing across the curriculum. The demonstrations were marvelous. As a group we responded to each of the demonstrations. Below are some of the responses I wrote for our group.

Ryan’s demonstration involved initiating a pen pal relationship via blogging between his AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) students and university students currently enrolled in an English methods course. Dan had his students use wikis in his demonstration lesson in a collaborative manner to build vocabulary skills at the secondary level.

Response to Ryan’s Demonstration

This approach would be motivating for students as it involves technology. It is also concrete and relates to his students as individuals. Ryan was very clear in his presentation and had obviously thought about the best way to present this in his classroom. He did a good job of addressing the needs of his students who are at risk. When safety issues were brought up, Ryan shared that he considered this and was very open to suggestions, such as teacher oversight and cautiously initially matching the college and high school students. Our group strongly feels that parents should have access to their student’s writing and therefore a password is necessary.

We love that Ryan will be able to follow these students for four years and will be able to get to know them well. Tiffany noted an analogy to the Freedom Writers, 9th grade students at risk for dropping out who were given experiences they would not otherwise have had. The relationship that these students and teacher developed was very powerful and supportive of success. Hopefully, Ryan will be able to help foster similar relationships between his AVID students and college mentors.

Many of us, including Ryan, were concerned about having students use a blog; however, our group also discussed an advantage of blogging. In her book, Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott described how devastated she was by poor reviews, comments over the phone or communication in person. Anne described dramatic reactions and taking comments very personally. It helped her to have some time to privately process the negative comments. Later, she was better able to accept constructive criticism and more likely to profit from the suggestions. An advantage to blogging is that it is less personal. You check the blog on your time and you can rant and rave privately, give yourself time to process, and possibly be more receptive to what was (hopefully) intended from it – i.e. constructive feedback.

The use of blogging enables people from diverse cultures to interact and get to know each other, possibly with less preconceived notions. Our group was concerned about students who might have less or no access to the internet at home due to lifestyle or accessibility to the internet.

Questions: How do you deal with minimal or nonparticipation in the blogging process- particularly on the college student’s part? How would you ensure that the college student actually does the job? And if he/she doesn’t, who deals with this?

Response to Dan’s Demonstration

Dan’s demonstration lesson was collaborative and fun for the students. Using wikis can be less threatening than other modes of learning vocabulary and the lesson was devised so that everyone participated. As an interactive approach, Dan’s lesson appealed to a variety of learning styles including visual, literal and intrepretive. This type of lesson was more authentic in that this type of writing is actually needed in the workplace and college. The collaborative interaction was also more authentic for real world projects.

Dan’s lesson utilized collaboration and valued the process of learning – not just coming up with “the answer”. Critical skills and interpretive skills were encouraged. We also noted that this approach gave the teacher an opportunity to demonstrate and teach respect when utilizing technology. The teacher modeled using respectful words and actions when adjusting the students’ previous work. This was another example of skills (correcting/adjusting/adding to another’s work) important for college and the eventual workplace. We also liked the way the lesson built on each others’ knowledge to teach vocabulary.

This lesson addressed language arts standards on many levels – from writing for a purpose to understanding readings from a wide range of texts. Students will “apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts”. They can “draw on their prior experience, their interactions with other readers and writers, their knowledge of word meaning and of other texts, their word identification strategies, and their understanding of textual features” to figure out the meanings of the selected vocabulary terms.

It is important for the teacher to clearly communicate the specific purpose for this lesson both for themselves and for their students. Additionally, the expectations for the use of the technology should be made explicit.

As an extension, students can come up with their own words or this can be used with regularly scheduled dictionary words. To encourage leadership skills, students can choose words and lead the activity. This can be particularly beneficial for students who crave attention/ “air time” . It can provide them with appropriate attention from their classmates.

Questions: How do you set up the lesson to prevent and/or deal with students who are “mean” to others? How does the teacher deal with difficult issues? – maybe make those a “live” discussion? How much do you monitor? How do you deal with so much writing? What do you assess? Do you give expectations for quality (and specify areas you are looking for) ahead of time? Do you assess for knowledge of the book, use of technology, quantitative amount of writing and/or quality of writing? We also talked about the use of hedge words and I-messages and the importance of clear feedback by the teacher to lead the students to more critical thinking on their own.

In many of this summer’s demonstrations, perspective taking was implied or directly addressed. For example, in Ryan’s demonstration, he encouraged an on-line relationship between his AVID students and college mentors in hopes that the AVID students will take their mentor’s perspective and better understand college life as well as enabling the mentor to understand life from the AVID student’s perspective. Hillary’s demonstration had us interpreting lyrics, first from our own perspective, and then with some knowledge of the writer’s perspective. For Elaine’s, we wrote rhyme and rime to interpret everyday objects which resulted in a variety of perspectives. Ellen helped us look at hip-hop culture from an educational perspective that led us to a better understanding of the cultural, historical and sociopolitical underpinnings of hip hop and potential incorporation in the classroom. Christine had us interpreting poems in order to read these reflective of the author’s perspective. After analyzing two characters from different time periods, Pat had us use a cultural-response approach to take the perspective of these characters and create a conversation between them keeping true to each character. Given a specific perspective, Morgan had us create a profile in a social network after which we discussed how this would change if the audience (perspective) changed. In small groups, we interpreted Tiffany’s picture books and had to choose from whose perspective to write and whether or not to change that perspective. Dumi had different readers read sections of a book, Voices in the Park, in order to highlight different perspectives. Her project helped us to appreciate different viewpoints and voices and to think about encouraging students from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds to learn from one another. Adele had us researching objects from a museum so we could better understand whatever perspective we chose to investigate – cultural, historical, commercial, etc. And Amber had us read articles on Micheal Jackson from a variety of perspectives and then create a storyboard to portray each perspective.

Assistant Professor at Harvard Graduate School of Education, Hunter Gehlbach, notes in his “Social Perspective Taking: A Multidimensional Approach”, “Social perspective taking can influence many elements of the academic experience… Furthermore, understanding other peoples and cultures is a fundamental component of literature, foreign languages, history, social studies and virtually all the other social science disciplines.” Gehlbach recommends that students seek out multiple viewpoints and that education encourage this.

Our world has become smaller and we have instant access to a variety of cultures with different experiences. We have to consider others’ viewpoints and figure out how to respect differing opinions, how to be open to other’s ideas, how to respectfully disagree, how to embrace novel thoughts, and how to be assertive, when needed, in a respectful manner. I believe that there is commonality – basic values of respect and responsibility – that will lead us to common ground. First we also need to know and to understand. When we begin to take another’s perspective, we begin the process of understanding. Then we can go about the business of true communication and the harder work of solving problems.

Many moons ago, my friend, Kathy, and I decided to travel to the Boundary Waters, a wilderness area in northern Minnesota, on a canoeing and camping trip. We were straight out of graduate school, broke, and had little to no experience in camping, much less “wilderness” camping. But, I vaguely remembered a presentation I saw in high school that really captured my interest… and I had read a book. I mentioned to Kathy that I wrote a will which I had been meaning to do for quite a while and felt that this was a good excuse to finally put it on paper. Kathy howled over that one and asked just how dangerous this venture was going to be. However, weeks later, when I entered her apartment, I found that she had taken it to heart. As I walked in, I noticed sticky notes (although back then it was probably scotched taped notes) on many of her possessions. Upon inquiring of their purpose, Kathy informed me that she wanted people to know what they should get if she doesn’t return. Now, it was my turn to howl with laughter.

We had perused several suggested packing lists for this undertaking which we discussed ad finitum on the phone, but we still had to look through everything and make final decisions. This is a really important part of the preparation because whatever you bring goes on your back during a portage. And whatever you don’t have, you can’t run down the street to get. So we had to be wise in our inexperienced choices. After some intense decision making, we packed up her Golf Volkswagon and were off. Driving straight through was no problem (even though it was a good 12 hours) as we had both been working at new jobs and Kathy had recently moved to Springfield. We joyously chatted away, excited about our upcoming adventure. By late evening, we arrived in Ely Minnesota, and decided to stay in the town’s park for a good (and cheap) night’s sleep. After all, Kathy’s car seats could go all the way back – a novel idea back then. Even though we did not reach REM, we enjoyed complaining and just chatting. Bright and early, we visited a gas station restroom to clean up. We had some breakfast from our food in the cooler and got our last minute items – food, postcards, a camping saw and lures – and drove to the ranger’s station to get our reservation. In those days there was no nightly cost to camp, but there was a nominal fee for the reservation. There are about 87 “put-in” points where one can start a trip, but the number of campers is kept to a limit in this more than one million acre wilderness. Similarly, the number in a party is limited. All this is done so we do not over-impact the breath-takingly beautiful natural environment. You can only camp at designated areas identified by a fire grate and a latrine off in the nearby woods. (I think it’s just a ploy to get us out of the canoe time after time to search for the fire grate.) There are very strict rules about what people can bring into this protected wilderness – no cans or glass (remind me to tell you about the illicit exploding single serving can of spaghetti O’s for my 4 year old), no firearms, no soap within 50 feet of the shoreline, take out what you bring in (yes, you end up with one smelly, but small, garbage bag) and, of course, life jackets are required. During dry hot times, you cannot have a fire for fear of it spreading, so you cook with the small portable stove you brought (that is, unless you decided that fire restrictions were so unlikely to occur that you kept it at home, you didn’t want to schlep it and the fuel on your back, and/or you like eating lots and lots of granola, beef jerky and cookies). Then there are my favorite rules: only take pictures (don’t take rocks, plants, leeches, snakes…) and leave your campsite better than you found it. The latter generally means to clean up the residue in the camp ashes, pick up any garbage in the site and leave lots of firewood.

We did not have a clue what we were getting into, and that was part of the adventure. For example, we packed enough food for a month, making wild guesses how far we would travel on Hunter’s Loop each day. We were out 14 days. We packed our sleeping bags in stuff sacks figuring that they would keep dry that way. It rained for 13 out of 14 days … and everything got wet. On overcast, but not rainy mornings, we hung toilet paper on bushes and damp sleeping bags from tree branches to dry – kinda. We knew that we had to pack our food in garbage bags and hang the food sack high in a tree and out on a limb, so bears wouldn’t be attracted to our site. The first night we crammed all our food in one bag (weighing a gazillion pounds), got out the diagram, found two trees almost the right distance apart and huffed and puffed to get it as high as we could with an elaborate system of ropes. We managed to get it right at bear height – he wouldn’t even have to bend over to help himself. All night that first night, we heard a bear going through the bag. “He found the cereal. There goes the bacon. I think he’s into the cookies now.” Fortunately, at the break of dawn, all was as it had been at midnight, just two tired campers ready to face another day, relieved that there was still food to be had.

I also agree with your observation of our days being full of responsibilities.  I try to find common joy in routine tasks and incorporate communication and interaction within daily routines.  We do have to be more planful just to get it all in and we have to forgive ourselves, and, like we tell our students, remember that tomorrow is another day and another opportunity.  When we reach out to others struggling with this, I believe that it helps not only them, but ourselves.  We are all in the same boat no matter how different our experiences.  I have a strong belief that “we all have our own stories”.  As I visited my parents in a nursing home several years ago this became even clearer to me.  There are fascinating stories from many residents.  At work I hear families’ stories so often and I am moved each time to learn of their struggles and how they have coped.  It is humbling.  It makes me mad when others make assumptions about families from their children’s behavior that can be quite off the mark.  Assumptions can be dangerous and very disrespectful.  The more we know about each other, the more connected we become.  Sounds like a segway to Web 2.0.

Dumi,

I keep thinking about your story.  I enjoy reading it, but I relished it when you read it to me during our writing group.  It is a story I will share with my daughter.  I think that you will really like Janice Harrington when she comes to visit.  She is a professional story teller who does a superb job with her craft.  She used to work at the Urbana Free Library, but I am not sure if she is still there or maybe at the Champaign library or maybe elsewhere.  At any rate, she has such an expressive way of telling stories with her voice and her body language.  She gets right up close to her students and brings them into the story.  You have to experience it to understand.  Over the years, I have also enjoyed a storyteller named Mike Anderson.  My family just happened upon him in a lodge in northern Minnesota when my daughter was too young for wilderness camping yet.  He is/was a third grade teacher in Springfield, Illinois.  He also makes and plays an instrument called the dulcimer.  His stories are very engaging for children and as an adult I enjoy them, too.  He tells stories about growing up in the Peoria area.  Many of his stories involve his best friend, Denny.  He often takes liberty with reality, but all in good fun.  I introduced him to my nieces in California (gave them his web site and sent them audiotapes/discs of his stories) and one of them developed an online friendship/mentoring relationship with him as he encouraged her writing.  Another storyteller whom I have enjoyed for most of my life is Bill Cosby.  When I was in 3rd grade, I remember saving money so I could bicycle to our Osco’s store and buy his albums.  If you are not familiar with him, he tells stories about his experiences growing up and he has continued to chronicle his life experiences through stories of his youth, college days, marriage, babies, middle age and old age.  The stories are ones that many of us can relate to and he has such a talented way of making common everyday things we do such a stitch.  When my parents were in a nursing home, we spent hours listening to the audiotapes I have and I also found a couple of videos.  When they were on, we were guaranteed to have company stop by.  I was so glad that I could find things that just made them laugh.  And, later, we could quote him, or laugh at similar experiences.    I do the same with my daughter.  We also like listening to books on tape/disc in the car and then talking about them later.  I recently commented on Morgan’s blog about time being precious.  Listening to Books on disc is one way we share a fun experience together while in the car.  That’s the only place we listen to them usually – although sometimes I will take one out with me while I am gardening.  I have a saying I thought was unique, but I read it later so I guess I can’t claim credit for it:  “There is no time like the present and there is no present like time.”

Accompanying people from our sister community in Calavera was an experience to be savored. Our church annually sends a delegation of volunteers to Calavera, a group of five settlements in a remote part of El Salvador. I volunteered to join the group at their 12th annual trip, not really knowing what I was getting into. Our group consisted of our priest, Father Tom, our chorus director and organizer, Kathy Fries, translators, Anna Maria and her almost 15 year old daughter, Natalia, and two wonderful nuns/nurses from the East coast, Ceil and Dianne. We could not have had a better group of individuals. For a couple of weeks before leaving, we packed large suitcases with medical and school supplies that we would give to each community. We each had our own backpack and one of the large supply suitcases to check in. Everyone in our group was very kind and most had done this before. I felt less experienced and lacking in knowledge in how this all worked, but I was very comfortable with the traveling and camping part of it and I really enjoyed my companions. We flew from Indianapolis to Philadelphia and then on to San Salvador. It was obvious that rituals had been established from previous trips. We visited the church where Arch Bishop Oscar Romero was murdered and also visited his tomb. This was a moving journey and it was fascinating to listen to our priest relate stories of this martyr. I felt honored to be witnessing these strong feelings. We talked with the people from the community organization who was helping us with the details and logistics of our trip. The next morning, they drove us to an accessible village where there was a celebration for us. Even though I could not understand the language, they were all obviously very happy to have us there and very grateful that we came to “accompany” them. From this village, we started our hike to the first settlement. The terrain was pretty level, although rocky at times, but it felt like a long hike. The people of the village hiked with us, little children skipped ahead and passed us on the narrow path, then nimbly ran back again. We tried really hard not to pant and ask, “Are we there yet?” Many of the boys and men offered to take our backpacks and carry them for us. Another group of men were hand-carrying the very heavy supply suitcases. I don’t remember the distance, but I bet it was no more than four miles – and this was the shortest hike by far. We soon learned not to turn down the kind offers to carry things for us. At times we stopped to catch our breath, bent over to redistribute the weight and trudged on. Although we were not yet in the highest altitudes we would go, it was still significantly higher than we were used to. At each of the villages, a family put us up for the night. Each day included a medical clinic, a lesson for the schools and mass in each community. We spent the day hiking and when we entered the next settlement, we were welcomed by the community, usually with some type of ceremony – plays, dances, music, readings, etc. It meant a lot to the people of Calavera to have us come personally to their communities to “accompany” them. And it was touching and amazing to be accompanied by so many people in each community as we walked both to their community and to the next community. We met each evening with the leaders of the communities to talk about their needs, progress from the previous year and ways we can assist them over time. There were definite leaders and politics involved. Anna Maria was a marvelous translator. Not only did she have an intimate command of the language, she could also translate innuendoes and what was not said. It was very helpful to get her feedback and assessment as she better understood the culture, history and politics.