LTDC Online News

Starting the session off Cheryl Deirmeyer from UW-Madison, noted that roughly a year ago in the Pyle Center marked the start of a digital storytelling event that kicked off her (and others) participation in learning about the storytelling method. The event triggered additional opportunities for interested faculty to participate in a digital storytelling workshop offered by the Center for Digital Storytelling. The session itself was more of an open discussion format. Feeding the discussion were 4 instructor or instructional technology types who were able to share their experiences with the digital story telling process:

Jane Henderson (UW Stout)
Caton Roberts (UW Madison)
Jim Winship (UW Whitewater)
Mary Wright (UW River Falls)

The discussion itself was primarily audience driven and free flowing. Initial remarks focused on terminology since some of the audience was familiar with the concept of digital storytelling whereas others were not. To aid in the discussion, UW Whitewater has a site up where faculty stories are presented as examples.

Another term presented during the course of the conversation was that of ’story circles’ where students discuss and vet story ideas with classmates. A video campfire was an alternate description–the key point of students gathered in a small group discussion sharing ideas and providing feedback. Ideas for visual or audible elements would also often result from the sharing.

In some cases students initially have the impression that they have nothing to say in a story format. But after getting engaged by the process students tend to discover that they have much more to say, and the story telling process forces students to distill stories down to single points. To aid in this, digital storytelling projects often utilize a single question students are expected to answer through the sharing of their stories.

Grading within the storytelling context could be done with rubrics, but it was also noted that ill-conceived efforts are usually easy to identify. Student completed rubrics or critiques, while not used by any of the panelists, seemed like a possible way to engage students further in the process–however trust is an important aspect to be sensitive to in a storytelling activity as some stories may leave participants more vulnerable than what’s comfortable.

In closing, large class sizes face additional challenges in the digital storytelling context. Panelists roughly agreed that 20-24 participants is the ideal group size. However some form of online component could aid in the sharing of stories with larger classes.

Blogger: Scott Reeser (UW Extension)