Digital Storytelling

I just want to remind you all of the Department of Education’s invitation to have students (13 years and older) share the importance and relevance that their education has and will have in their lives. The deadline is Monday, November 2nd.
Reposted from September 26th:

I am what I Learn

Apparently, that’s what the Department of Education thinks and would like to hear students’ thinking on that in a 2 minute video. And by student they mean “an active middle, secondary or college student 13 years or older.” I’m sure they set 13 as the starting point because of YouTube’s terms of service. If sharing their viewpoint with the federal government isn’t enough of an incentive for your students, the three winners will also receive a $1,000 award.

And if your students don’t want to or can’t enter the actual contest, they could still take the challenge to share their feelings with the class, school, administration, and maybe even the community as a whole. This is a great opportunity to encourage your students to think about what value they place on their education (and what investment they need to make personally).

One of the contests that tickles this old linguistics guy’s fancy is the one a couple of MIT alumni run celebrating vocabulary words: Brainyflix and Brainypics. This time they are starting out with a Brainypics flashcard contest, in which students create interesting sentences and pair them up with memorable pictures as a visual cue.  Between now and Dec. 7 they will be selecting 5 Brainypics each week which will qualify for the Grand Prize of $200.  They are also giving out iTunes songs for every 5 Brainypics created and gift cards to the runner ups of the finale.  Full details here: http://brainyflix.com/main/contest_rules.

And if a $30,000 classroom makeover puts a song in your heart, how about making your own music video explaining the value of technology in education? eInstruction’s contest has three categories spread through K-12. Get your song in by Nov. 10th to be considered.

Just a little under 3 weeks left in the Department of Education’s contest asking for videos answering the question, “Why is your education important to fulfilling your dreams?” November 2nd is the deadline and 13 is the minimum age to enter.

Upload a 1-2 minute video, podcast, or other multimedia file that explains how you use Discovery Education resources to engage your students. Whether you take students on virtual field trips, or guide students as they produce their own multimedia projects, we’d like to share your ideas with the entire Discovery Education community. Each submitter will receive a limited edition Discovery Education sweatshirt “hoodie” just in time for the changing seasons. Upload your submission by 8pm EST on November 15th.
For the details log in to your streaming account through discoveryeducation.com/awesome

Apparently, that’s what the Department of Education thinks and would like to hear students’ thinking on that in a 2 minute video. And by student they mean “an active middle, secondary or college student 13 years or older.” I’m sure they set 13 as the starting point because of YouTube’s terms of service. If sharing their viewpoint with the federal government isn’t enough of an incentive for your students, the three winners will also receive a $1,000 award.

And if your students don’t want to or can’t enter the actual contest, they could still take the challenge to share their feelings with the class, school, administration, and maybe even the community as a whole. This is a great opportunity to encourage your students to think about what value they place on their education (and what investment they need to make personally).

Just got a press release from the American Film Institute announcing a major upgrade for the ScreenNation site. There doesn’t seem to be a hard date yet, so I’m guessing by the end of summer at the latest. Join me in posting some of your favorite moivemaking how-to’s and/or encourage your students to share their work with the world.

Dear Educators:

This summer, the American Film Institute will launch a complete redesign of AFI ScreenNation - AFI’s Web site dedicated to featuring the best teen filmmakers on the Web.

The big difference is that AFI ScreenNation has been re-tooled to fully integrate YouTube into its framework.

In fact, AFI ScreenNation is part of an ambitious overhaul of AFI.com to include AFI’s Digital Archive. This means that teen filmmakers will have an opportunity to be featured next to videos that include AFI Life Achievement Award winners, AFI television programming and featured films from AFI Fellows and Alumni.

Furthermore, AFI ScreenNation will still include helpful tips and tutorial videos, as well as the complete instructional series LIGHTS, CAMERA, EDUCATION!

Now is your chance to recommend teen filmmakers to AFI ScreenNation. If you or a teen filmmaker that you know has a YouTube link to submit, please send it in an e-mail to screennation@afi.com.

Most of us think of June 6th as D-Day, the Normandy Invasion. Well my neighbors and their teacher, Tricia Fuglestad, down at the Dryden school here in Arlington Heights, IL added their own “D” this year on June 6th as they won two first place awards at the Shortie Awards festival in D.C.

I had mentioned “Let’s be Green” in my re-cap of our state festival but had never seen Tricia’s own work about when red met green, “Complementary in Every Way” before. Leave it to an art teacher!

Complementary in Every Way from Tricia Fuglestad on Vimeo.Check out all of this year’s winners in news, documentary, animation, and teacher created at http://www.shortie.org. Tricia, by the way, is an alumna of our Wilkes U./Discovery Education Digital Storytelling class (but not a section I taught personally- sigh!).

The latest round of winners have been announced in ISTE’s 30th anniversary, tell your technology story. But don’t dismay - you still have until June 15th to upload your story to be in the running for a trip to NECC Denver in 2010. Check out all the videos celebrating our journey incorporating technology into the classroom and ISTE’s 30th at http://www.istevision.org.

Kindergarten teacher Al Doss snagged an HP mini laptop for “Al’s Ah Ha Moment.” How can a brick and an Apple IIgs lead to a technology enriched classroom?

“New T-E-C-H-nology“  is a fun take off on a commercial done by engaged high school students who like learning in teams. Their effort won a Flip Ultra video camcorder.

Jack Tovey’s “Art for the Digital Generation” puts a new spin on Picasso and got him a copy of the ISTE book Visual Arts Units for All Levels.

Since NECC is just four weeks away and the deadline to get your impact of technology story celebrating ISTE’s 30th anniversary in, in time for this month’s drawing (an HP mini notebook or iPod touch, Flip video camera, and the ISTE book, Visual Arts Units for All Levels) deadline is May 31st, I thought it a good time for a little reminder. The grand prize will be a trip to NECC 2010 in Denver. You can see plenty of contributions already at the ISTE Vision website but might you not have some thoughts to add also? All submissions will be playing on special kiosks throughout the NECC convention center.

Graphic from ISTE’s site supporting your learning (and teaching) journey with a focus on digital citizenship.

The clock is winding down on this year’s Discovery Education and 3M Young Scientist Challenge. To add just a little more impetus to your students joining in or simply using digital storytelling to share what they know or care about in science, last year’s Young Scientist of the Year, Melissa Rey, will be doing a webinar Wednesday, May 13th. Whether you plan on throwing your hat in the ring or just want some ideas to get or keep your students interested in science, this should be an hour well spent with an exceptional young lady. Register here for the 1:00 PM EDT webinar.

 

FYI, just got this from the Center for Digital Storytelling:

Dear Friends of the Center for Digital Storytelling,

As we wrote last month, the 2nd International Day for Sharing Life Stories will take place this Saturday,  May 16th, 2009.

We are asking all of the folks on our mailing list to take 10 minutes this week to visit http://www.ausculti.org and join on our newly updated website.  Log in to add your name, information about your organization’s work, links about sites related to your work, or of general interest to our communities.

We have also built the site so that each point on the map can include a media story.  You will simply need to  copy the embed code from the story (as with Youtube videos) and paste it into your post on the site.

About the International Day

Began last year as an opportunity to celebrate and promote life stories, as well as a way to encourage critical thinking, cultural democratization and social transformation. The International Day is organized by The Museum of the Person International Network (Brazil, Portugal, USA and Canada) and the Center for Digital Storytelling (USA, Canada, Denmark, Czech Republic, Ireland and Portugal)

The chosen theme for this years’ Day is Journey for Justice – Migration and Refugees. The Human Rights Commission of U.N. estimates that there are currently 21 million refugees in the world. According to the International Organization for Migration, there are 200 million international immigrants all over the world. We want to hear the stories of people who have experienced migration in order to develop dialogue about this important matter in our societies and promote social change.

The day was chosen in part to honor Studs Terkel, the American writer, radio journalist and oral historian who passed away in October of last year.  Studs would have celebrated his 97th birthday this May 16.

Besides that, we could not leave aside the importance of any other person’s life stories. So, whatever your work with life stories is, join us!

The idea of the ausculti.org website is to show these stories and to promote a space for listening and exchanging experiences.

Post your stories, listen to other stories, and celebrate this day with us!