New Classroom Technologies

This year, to change up the research paper presentations, I asked my action research partner Fran Prather to prepare a lesson introducing critical media literacy skills, especially with visual information,  as she introduced the concept of digital storytelling to my English IV classes. First, we administered  a survey to find out what experience our students have had with Powerpoint, PhotoStory, or Windows Movie Maker (or any other movie program). Then, Fran and the class discussed the good, bad, and the ugly about Powerpoint presentations, and launched a video featuring a comic ripping on bad Powerpoints. Hilarious! Then this outstanding lesson continued as Fran  displayed an image and discussed the elements of the image (in this case, a picture of a Hatian woman in despair).  In the key part of the lesson, Fran presented the use of digital storytellng as a means of presenting their research topics to their peers. We both noticed that the video storytelling clips immediately engaged the students' attention. In one class, a presentation about tobacco companies' global marketing strategies was mis-interpreted to be a message to "stop smoking". NOWHERE in the presentation did this message occur! W believed that those students had a schema for PSA's about tobacco that truncated their ability to critically review. Later in the day, both of the other classes completely "got" the message of the clip. Interesting. The second clip, about Cesar Chavez didn't have voice overs that directed the viewers' attention. We expected students to not understand the video because of their lack of background knowledge. A few thought the protests and speeches featured were taking place in Mexico, and many were unfamiliar with Chavez's farm strikes and the issues around it. To gauge the quality and effectiveness of these presentations, Fran had an assessment for the clips on back of the survey. Animated discussion ensued as we walked through the  students' assessments of the presentations. 

Fran taught the first two senior English classes, and then I tried the lesson myself with another class. The lesson was so well crafted and demonstrated, that I found it easy (and fun!) to teach. Fran had organized the lesson and the clips through an attractive and professional-looking SMART Notebook 10 presentation. Fran's instructional design and choice of content structured the lesson to move learners from what they know (how to read an image) to the new learning - creating and evaluating a digital story.

Fran's lesson and use of our new classroom technologies inspired me. On the day following her presentation, I taught myself Notebook 10 in order to create a presentation for a staff development session I was giving on Wednesday on precis writing.  I then downloaded and inserted video clips from Discovery Education and linked web sites and documents.