Title: The First Pedagogy and the 21st Century

• Why tell a story?

Goals for this session:

1. Model sharing of stories
2. Reflect on why digital storytelling is engaging to an audience
3. Transfer activities to classroom practice

• Change and Leadership: How will you prepare yourself and your school for the 21st century? “You must be the change you see want to see in the world.” (Gandhi) – What do you want from a child? What situations will you put your students in? What choices will you offer your students? How will you empower your students? What sustenance will you provide?
• Digital Storytelling is a rich and deep teaching medium
• If you had to use a story in your classroom in the next month, how would you adapt it to your use? This is the most challenging aspect for teachers.
• Teachers need to make it relevant to themselves and their students
• An intro video example on digital storytelling from this Educational Uses of Digital Stories site
• Students become more engaged and learning is more meaningful – ask them to interact within curriculum – Students will become the curriculum
• Another form of storytelling is music (ex. Billy Joel “We Didn’t Start the Fire”- social comment from 1949-1989)
• Business student parody “We Didn’t Start the Crisis”
• Example story of “How Paul Bunyan became a Champion” (photos taken from Creative Commons)
• (C.Toy always stops before the end of the story and asks the audience to predict the ending in pairs – He then asks a reflection question related to the story)
• Point of View story example from elementary students on The 3 Little Pigs (example was a narrated photo slideshow – some stop motion animation applied with photos – some YouTube examples here)
• What are some things or practices that are made of straw, sticks and bricks in our classrooms and schools? (Reflection question related to story)
  
• Musical Stories are another possibility: Social studies example
• How might you use music to reach and teach more students?
• Chris Toy then concluded with some stories about student work regarding problem/project/challenged based learning
• He used these videos: Elem example, HS example
• What can you share about your school’s initiatives through Digital Storytelling?
• Poetry and the Parable: Blind Man & Elephant example using simply Keynote style

Go here if you need further info regarding the use of video in the classroom. The site offers student examples, lesson ideas and rubrics. I also have some film and video lesson ideas here on my wiki too that may be of interest. But the mother of all ideas may come from Alan Levine’s 50+ Web 2.0 Ways To Tell a Story.

It inspired me to give it a try as I can see this as something my grade 6 or 7 students would enjoy. At times I wish I was still an elementary classroom teacher as I would use this to inspire creative writing (do the art first and then look at it to see what story comes to them).

First create a line doodle and then start looking for images to fill in. My first photo is the original doodle and the second is the completed piece. Click it to take you to the larger Flickr image. I used B2 sized paper (500mm x 707mm) and marker. There’s also a simple video below showing the stages of development.

video link here

(found via Sir Ken Robinson on Twitter)

(video link here)

Livebrush is a free drawing application but a download and install is required. My abstract image above was created in about 3 minutes.

It employs an easy-to-use brush tool that reacts to your gesture. By combining simple motion controls with brush styles, Livebrush offers a fun and unique way to create graphics.

At times I felt like I wasn’t in control but I must admit it was pretty fun. Here’s an introductory video below.

(special thanks to this amazing guy for the find!)

My school hosts a yearly educational conference called “Bridging the Gap” (Nov. 19-21), which is open to all staff and parents. Several teachers from the local area will be presenting as well as Kim Cofino.  Now in it’s 8th year, the school has also included unconferences and BarCamps. The theme this year is on education and technology with an emphasis on, What does 21st century education look like? I’m not sure if it looks like anything, but I do know that processes and ways to present sure have changed.

I’ll be presenting on essential 2.0 tools for teachers and students. I had a very long list and managed to narrow it down to about 15. I was speaking to some teachers though and was surprised to hear that some still do not know what RSS is, see the relevancy of blogs or even know they can create their own wiki. There still seems to be some divide. I may need to revisit this list so as not to info-whelm everyone and cater to some of those entry-level teachers. (Hey, at least they are showing up to learn. That’s the first step.) Once done, I’ll post all the resources here. If you feel you have a kicker of a resource/essential app tool, please do drop me a line to share.

UPDATE: My list now has 25 essential tools. I thought I should include some more basic stuff for the beginners.

All this recent artwork posting is due to several of my units finishing simultaneously and me making the conscious decision to try and do more art. Next year I’ll start that personal art blog.

In the meantime, allow me to indulge in sharing this quick painting/ink sketch of my dad and I in a photo booth when I was approximately 5 or 6 years old. He regrettably passed away this year.

(270mm x 345mm)