Just finished one summer class

whoooo hoo. Just got done teaching my digital storytelling class. At Media Bridges, we have a series of youth classes lasting a week or two. Mine lasted one week, 3 hours a day. And the ages were 9 - 15. You would think that the 15 year old would have been bothered by the younger ones, but they all got along really well.

At first I was worried because I didn't think we would get done in time. But the opposite happened - most of them were done before. And of course these kids love to play on the internet. Games games games and videos on you tube and their myspace pages. So advanced and so little in the attention span department. One kid continually preferred to watch remix videos of happy feet, spongebob, and dora to music like ' party like a rock star' gggeeez.

Anyways. I didn't have much in the means of curriculum. I have found that kids in this age range don't pay attention to hand outs or class instruction. What worked well was me going around to each group (singles and doubles) and explain the steps as they approach them. Some needed more attention then others and it all balanced out pretty well.

Before the class started, I scoured through most of the material out there about the topic. All of it was useful information, but nothing was quite tailered to a youth class outside of school. I also kinda dreaded pulling personal stories out of these kids. Originally I was going to have them bring personal items from home like photos, toys, etc and make a digital story about themselves. BUT - the education coordinator here had a great idea- a field trip! I highly suggest this approach if you are working with a group of kids in a short amount of time.

We took a trip to the Contemporary Art Center in Cincinnati, just a few blocks away. They have a great children's floor called the UnMuseum, filled with interactive art. So we all went on Monday with video cameras that could also take photos (though I can see now, that the quality is not so great on video). They had two hours to play, explore and take pictures and even some video too. Before sending them off, I told them what I was looking for: a picture of their favorite piece, least favorite, the coolest part, and if you would come back again. And guess what? Only a few of them remembered to include these things on their own, while I had to remind some others, and some still did not include those parts.

I wanted to avoid the whole bit about pointing out unneccessary things like: "this is a crazy room" "this is a chalkboard". But I still got that. It's a challange to get some kids to talk more in depth about the pictures they took and how they feel about it. Everytime I asked them how they feeeeel about something, I felt rather cheesy and almost like a therapist.

So here are some logistics if anyone tries this in the future:
- 10 kids (that was our maximum)
- 5 computers (MACS) + the instructer's computer was also used
- 5 cameras (they shared, and that worked out!)
- I imported the pictures and the videos to save time
- used iPhoto to edit and adjust pictures
- iMovie
- on the 2nd day, I put all the pictures and all the videos on everyone's computer, then they worked at that computer all week.
- used our radio room to record the voice overs (kinda a luxury, any mic on a computer will do)
- when some kids were finished early, and if interested, I let them make their own music using Soundtrack, a companion to Final Cut. It's a loop based program that's easier than Garageband (i think)
- and voila! we had the screening party today

At first I tried to keep them off the internet. Especially the younger, less focused kids. They all have myspace pages and love the branded games of the disney channel. But by the third day, seeing how quickly they worked through, I gave in. It's not ideal. But at least it kept them occupied while the other kids were working. Also, those were also the kids that had those frickin roller shoes. Any moment I was not looking, a few would leave their computers and skate around every where. these crazy kids with their crazy shoes.

In the end, the class turned out quite well. They all finished their stories - 5 total. I'll post those up soon. I can't watch their videos right now, I've seen them too many times already. I am happy to say that some of them are really good and definitely qualified as well thought out digital stories.

Now it's off to prepare for next month's week long class- Ad Attack! (that exclamation point is part of the title).

Comment from danielle martin on July 11, 2007 - 5:49pm

You ROCK! Sounds awesome and thanks for all the juicy details in your post. You could publish the stories on StoriesForChange.net and Jess & I would be psyched! And if you add it as an Event, you can see all the stories together...see the workshop I just did in Roxbury with youth http://storiesforchange.net/event/teen_digital_storymapping_bootcamp

I'm of the tack that any story kid take this gumption to finish is GREAT!

For Ad Attack, see if you can get your hands on MNN's media literacy curriculum...it's awesome. I have a paper one I could send you if you can't get it online.

-Danielle