Life's Lessons- A Personal Video and a lesson of another sort

You can't teach an old dog a new trick.  Old cliche.  Education must change and progress and as such the classroom.  Technology isn't just added to the curriculum but drives education today as it does our everyday lives.  Iste.nets standards dictate a digital age learning environment.  Digital storytelling creates such an environment.  Students become the producers and involved in their learning process.  Multiple use of media to solve technological difficulties prepare them for the workforce while learning and demonstrating core curriculum.  In creating my digital story, I was very much a part of the trial and error process advocated by the "How to Use Digital Storytelling" website.  The technology has evolved tremendously from the early days, but it still takes patience to take the entire project from start to finish.  It requires a set of skills students need to learn to survive.  Taking an idea and seeing it through to fruition does not happen by accident.  In the old days we used scissors, glue and colors or construction paper.  Some had better artistic skills than others of course.  The advantage is for students to learn by trial and error.  Another advantage of the digital storytelling is students will take their work more seriously because it will be on display. I had a really hard time putting my video on YouTube due to being a private person not really given to sharing.  Even the project of a personal video was a daunting task because I am not really given to sharing detailed information at random.  I was never the student who raised my hand to answer questions in class.  However, reluctant students can overcome these obstacles due to the fact will anyone really see the video?  Also, any feedback from other students is usually positive.   A great side benefit of public showings is that your students will take their work very seriously. The knowledge that others are going to see it (and you can't hide C-quality work on a big screen) has been the source of tremendous inspiration for filmmakers for a hundred years. New, J. (2005)  By applying technology and thus learning to our daily lives students become less passive and more involved in class and lessons.  In this view, learning requires struggling to understand how new information meshes with existing knowledge and how to integrate into complex skills and abilities — not just remembering isolated facts or procedures. Shank, P. (n.d.)   Students who are more actively engaged will learn better and retain information.  Hands on working experience is always much better than theory.  Working with the imovie and technological aspects of this course has made me aware of the time consuming details involved, what difficulties students might encounter, and brainstorm possibilities for future assignments.  If I had just sat in a classroom and been shown examples of products, it would not have had the same impact as doing it myself.  Consider the world of difference between merely being able to restate information and the ability to apply the information in the course of living and working Shank, P. (n.d.) Which this concept also applies to ISTE.nets standards for teaching, learning and assessments using technology adding content standards differentiating instruction.



New, J. (2005). How to use digital storytelling in your classroom. Edutopia. Retrieved April 4, 2009, from http://www.edutopia.org/use-digital-storytelling-classroom
 Shank, P. (n.d.). The value of multimedia in learning. Think Tank. Retrieved May 5, 2009, from http://www.adobe.com/uk/designcenter/thinktank/valuemedia/