Zoë Randall Teacher Leadership Digital Portfolio
Reflection
As I was trying to come up with a great action research question, I reflected on some of the goals I wanted to accomplish during the year. I wanted to improve my multimedia curriculum by making it more meaningful. I wanted to have the best opportunities for my students by introducing new ways of expressing themselves. I hoped to create a project and develop a question that would help me understand my students better and build community. The time came for me to make a decision and I still wasn’t sure how I would decide. Then, a wise teacher leader who helped spark the idea for doing my first digital storytelling project, Stories of Service, chimed in her thoughts. How about digital storytelling?
Digital storytelling had made a huge impact on me and my students as we told the stories of veterans in my previous 8th grade class. But, how could I do a digital storytelling project for a whole semester with 6th graders? I had been challenged with not having enough time to do meaningful projects with my students, and I always felt rushed. It wasn’t until my advisor helped me to envision possibility that my year of digital storytelling began.
I began the digital storytelling project with the intention of instilling a sense of identity, empathy, and community in my students. I hoped that producing and sharing stories in the classroom would create bonds between students, increase knowledge of the individuals in the class, and create a sense of community. I spent many of the first weeks of school on culture building, creating norms for a positive learning environment, establishing classroom routines, and doing games and sharing circles to get to know everyone better. It was something I had never done in my class to this extent, and I knew that it was important to spend time getting to know my students as individuals who have personalities, feelings, and stories to share.
Before, this project, I saw my role as a teacher as someone who needed to teach content. But now, I see myself as a person and a teacher, capable of sharing herself and learning about her students and their lives. Digital Storytelling has opened up pathways to understanding my students better and understanding myself. I thought it would be all about them--their learning, their experience--but I see now that storytelling is a collective experience. Telling a story is a personal journey. Having an opportunity to reflect on your life can offer a lens through which to examine and ponder how you see yourself, your world, and others. Stories have an impact on both the viewer and producer. Everyone involved in the storytelling process experiences it on different levels. In the end, stories are gateways into seeing our students, sharing with each other, and learning about one another’s experiences. Schank states, “Learning from one’s own experiences depends on being able to communicate our experiences as stories to others” (1990, p. 12). Through the experience of watching the stories, we built a community of students who shared stories with an audience who listened to them and learned lessons from them.
Digital Storytelling has opened up avenues for myself as a teacher as well as for my students. I always gave up very little of myself in the classroom. I held this notion that teachers could not be themselves. I couldn’t share personal information with my students because I thought it violated boundaries I should keep between myself as a person and as a teacher. What I learned is the exact opposite. I found that when I shared my own personal stories with my students, they felt more comfortable with me which in turn made me more comfortable with them. I’m not saying that teachers should divulge their whole life story, but I shared stories with them that are important to me because that’s what I was asking my students to do. It was like a breath of fresh air, finally being just me in the classroom. I thought I would lose control of my class as a result, and respect as a teacher. I found that sharing myself led to me feeling more comfortable with myself as a teacher. Although I never asked directly if my sharing led to increasing their comfort in sharing, I suspect that it opened the door for many of my students.
By opening up myself to my students, I modeled one of the first hurdles in creating a community that values sharing personal stories. I also stepped outside of my own comfort zone and realized the benefits. When I look back, I had difficulty assessing the comfort levels of my students at the beginning of the year, because I didn’t ask the right questions. Understanding data collection was certainly challenging. I’ve learned that it is difficult to measure changes in your students when you’re not exactly sure what will change. Now that I know comfort with sharing was an outcome of my research, I know next time I will ask students to rate how comfortable they are sharing a personal story on a scale from 1-4. Then, I will try to assign certain comfort levels to my activities and let students choose their level. We could all begin at level one, but as we progress, students will choose to move up at their own pace, until hopefully they all arrive at being able to share their story with a public audience. This system will help me understand why students feel more or less comfortable to share. It will also serve as a better pre-and post-project measure of how much they change in comfort level.
Finding a story to tell doesn’t come easily and it is a different process for each person. I learned the nuances of how to make everyone feel successful in the project. Next time, I would like to structure the project better to allow for more individual conversations to emerge during the story phase. I remember feeling like students were not telling stories that had much heart. They seemed surface and without emotion. I wanted the stories to convey what the students felt, how the moment affected them, and what they learned as a result. Some stories were already developed and some needed more time. To facilitate this process, I found that working with the Humanities teacher to develop the script at the time they create the digital story helped students make stronger stories. When the 8th grade humanities teacher did a fishbowl activity in her class to find the heart of the story, students expressed the heart before making their stories digital. This activity led to making the digital story process more meaningful to the students, knowing that they had an important story they wanted to communicate.
A technical challenge was recording voiceovers for 112 students. Although it was a significant part of the process, it was very time consuming. I had the help of an expert voice actor, and two academic coaches, but even four adults had a difficult time recording the voices of every student. Some students recorded at home which helped the process. But what helped most was teaching students to record each other’s voiceover. I learned when I had 8th graders the value of peer teaching. When one student learned from me how to record a voiceover, that student taught the next student who was ready. The relay of information was the best and quickest approach for recording when there were only two quiet spaces in our school. I would definitely encourage this process next time.
When I reflect on the process of data collection, my success was sending out several surveys along the way to find out more information regarding student thinking in a quick and easy format. My difficulty was identifying my focus students sooner and talking to them throughout the project. Although it was helpful to talk to them months after the project had ended, I wish now that I had more conversations with them throughout.
The impacts of sharing have had lasting impressions on me and my students. After making the digital stories in my class, the 6th grade semester ended and they moved on but the lasting effect on them stayed. They learned so much from the sharing process, and exhibiting the stories to an audience left them feeling mostly proud and excited. In their Humanities class the next semester, they were asked to make a Public Service Announcement (PSA). The kids and their teacher shared with me that making the digital story helped them gain the skills needed to make their PSA. Some students returned the next semester to ask me for help on making movies for other events in their personal lives. Some students gave their digital stories they made in class as gifts to the family member they honored in the story. In the 8th grade, one student made a story about being a bone marrow donor to save her little brother. Her mother posted her story on Facebook as a way to communicate to others to become bone marrow donors. Another 8th grader wrote in her reflection that the digital story project helped them bond and make stronger friendships. When I think of the impacts and the continuation of the story process in these students’ lives, I feel fulfilled. I feel like as a teacher, I was able to give them the experience and the skills to create meaningful stories.
The impacts of digital storytelling were also met with challenges. Although I hoped that students would learn to share stories from their lives, the process was not helpful for some. I had difficulty reaching some of my students and it led to my own feelings of angst that I had not done my job to support them. It made me realize that some impacts can be negative on myself and the students. I hope that the next time I do this project I will be able to support every student. My goal is to not put pressure on anyone not ready to share. I also hope that in supporting students’ individual needs, I will be more accepting of the level they feel comfortable sharing.
What happens when students share the stories of themselves and others was a winding road leading to an audience. Supporting students along this road was challenging, but the success was getting everyone to the destination. At the end of the road, I recognized that we had come a long way. What I know now has helped me understand what stories kids want to share, what challenges arise as kids find their stories, and the importance of supporting all students at their comfort level. For those who aren’t sure about what to share, it’s important to remember that sharing at all is a big step towards learning to be more open in the future. I’ve learned that setting up a positive community where kids feel safe to share is vital to the process. I know that I need to do better in supporting struggling students. It is not easy to share something personal especially if it brings up painful memories. I hope next time, students can be more self-guided in determining their level of comfort with sharing stories. My hope in the project will continue to be engaging all students to comfortably share an aspect of their personal lives.
In sharing my work with others, I’ve learned that stories can all have a positive and meaningful effect on the storyteller and the audience. It’s important to encourage stories where kids felt good about themselves or successful. It’s also important to help students understand that although bad things happen in life, we learn lessons from them that help us carry on. The most valuable lesson I learned was to encourage student voice and give students a creative medium through which to express it. I hope their stories continue to make positive impacts on the people that watch them and learn from them.
My journey ends only to begin again. Now that I’ve learned how to use digital storytelling in my classroom and examined what happens, I hope to engage others to try it as I make steps to refine my project and try it again. Although it is a personal journey for anyone who attempts it, we can learn from each other about the insights we gained. As a teacher leader and researcher, I hope that my experience inspires others to learn about their students using digital storytelling. By having conversations with our kids and hearing what they have to say about their lives, I hope that we can encourage a new level of self-expression and comfort in the classroom. Together, I feel that we have the ability as teachers to make a positive difference by sharing our experiences and learning about our students’ lives. In the end, may many voices fill our hearts and souls as we encourage the creative practice of sharing our life experiences through digital storytelling!
Digital storytelling had made a huge impact on me and my students as we told the stories of veterans in my previous 8th grade class. But, how could I do a digital storytelling project for a whole semester with 6th graders? I had been challenged with not having enough time to do meaningful projects with my students, and I always felt rushed. It wasn’t until my advisor helped me to envision possibility that my year of digital storytelling began.
I began the digital storytelling project with the intention of instilling a sense of identity, empathy, and community in my students. I hoped that producing and sharing stories in the classroom would create bonds between students, increase knowledge of the individuals in the class, and create a sense of community. I spent many of the first weeks of school on culture building, creating norms for a positive learning environment, establishing classroom routines, and doing games and sharing circles to get to know everyone better. It was something I had never done in my class to this extent, and I knew that it was important to spend time getting to know my students as individuals who have personalities, feelings, and stories to share.
Before, this project, I saw my role as a teacher as someone who needed to teach content. But now, I see myself as a person and a teacher, capable of sharing herself and learning about her students and their lives. Digital Storytelling has opened up pathways to understanding my students better and understanding myself. I thought it would be all about them--their learning, their experience--but I see now that storytelling is a collective experience. Telling a story is a personal journey. Having an opportunity to reflect on your life can offer a lens through which to examine and ponder how you see yourself, your world, and others. Stories have an impact on both the viewer and producer. Everyone involved in the storytelling process experiences it on different levels. In the end, stories are gateways into seeing our students, sharing with each other, and learning about one another’s experiences. Schank states, “Learning from one’s own experiences depends on being able to communicate our experiences as stories to others” (1990, p. 12). Through the experience of watching the stories, we built a community of students who shared stories with an audience who listened to them and learned lessons from them.
Digital Storytelling has opened up avenues for myself as a teacher as well as for my students. I always gave up very little of myself in the classroom. I held this notion that teachers could not be themselves. I couldn’t share personal information with my students because I thought it violated boundaries I should keep between myself as a person and as a teacher. What I learned is the exact opposite. I found that when I shared my own personal stories with my students, they felt more comfortable with me which in turn made me more comfortable with them. I’m not saying that teachers should divulge their whole life story, but I shared stories with them that are important to me because that’s what I was asking my students to do. It was like a breath of fresh air, finally being just me in the classroom. I thought I would lose control of my class as a result, and respect as a teacher. I found that sharing myself led to me feeling more comfortable with myself as a teacher. Although I never asked directly if my sharing led to increasing their comfort in sharing, I suspect that it opened the door for many of my students.
By opening up myself to my students, I modeled one of the first hurdles in creating a community that values sharing personal stories. I also stepped outside of my own comfort zone and realized the benefits. When I look back, I had difficulty assessing the comfort levels of my students at the beginning of the year, because I didn’t ask the right questions. Understanding data collection was certainly challenging. I’ve learned that it is difficult to measure changes in your students when you’re not exactly sure what will change. Now that I know comfort with sharing was an outcome of my research, I know next time I will ask students to rate how comfortable they are sharing a personal story on a scale from 1-4. Then, I will try to assign certain comfort levels to my activities and let students choose their level. We could all begin at level one, but as we progress, students will choose to move up at their own pace, until hopefully they all arrive at being able to share their story with a public audience. This system will help me understand why students feel more or less comfortable to share. It will also serve as a better pre-and post-project measure of how much they change in comfort level.
Finding a story to tell doesn’t come easily and it is a different process for each person. I learned the nuances of how to make everyone feel successful in the project. Next time, I would like to structure the project better to allow for more individual conversations to emerge during the story phase. I remember feeling like students were not telling stories that had much heart. They seemed surface and without emotion. I wanted the stories to convey what the students felt, how the moment affected them, and what they learned as a result. Some stories were already developed and some needed more time. To facilitate this process, I found that working with the Humanities teacher to develop the script at the time they create the digital story helped students make stronger stories. When the 8th grade humanities teacher did a fishbowl activity in her class to find the heart of the story, students expressed the heart before making their stories digital. This activity led to making the digital story process more meaningful to the students, knowing that they had an important story they wanted to communicate.
A technical challenge was recording voiceovers for 112 students. Although it was a significant part of the process, it was very time consuming. I had the help of an expert voice actor, and two academic coaches, but even four adults had a difficult time recording the voices of every student. Some students recorded at home which helped the process. But what helped most was teaching students to record each other’s voiceover. I learned when I had 8th graders the value of peer teaching. When one student learned from me how to record a voiceover, that student taught the next student who was ready. The relay of information was the best and quickest approach for recording when there were only two quiet spaces in our school. I would definitely encourage this process next time.
When I reflect on the process of data collection, my success was sending out several surveys along the way to find out more information regarding student thinking in a quick and easy format. My difficulty was identifying my focus students sooner and talking to them throughout the project. Although it was helpful to talk to them months after the project had ended, I wish now that I had more conversations with them throughout.
The impacts of sharing have had lasting impressions on me and my students. After making the digital stories in my class, the 6th grade semester ended and they moved on but the lasting effect on them stayed. They learned so much from the sharing process, and exhibiting the stories to an audience left them feeling mostly proud and excited. In their Humanities class the next semester, they were asked to make a Public Service Announcement (PSA). The kids and their teacher shared with me that making the digital story helped them gain the skills needed to make their PSA. Some students returned the next semester to ask me for help on making movies for other events in their personal lives. Some students gave their digital stories they made in class as gifts to the family member they honored in the story. In the 8th grade, one student made a story about being a bone marrow donor to save her little brother. Her mother posted her story on Facebook as a way to communicate to others to become bone marrow donors. Another 8th grader wrote in her reflection that the digital story project helped them bond and make stronger friendships. When I think of the impacts and the continuation of the story process in these students’ lives, I feel fulfilled. I feel like as a teacher, I was able to give them the experience and the skills to create meaningful stories.
The impacts of digital storytelling were also met with challenges. Although I hoped that students would learn to share stories from their lives, the process was not helpful for some. I had difficulty reaching some of my students and it led to my own feelings of angst that I had not done my job to support them. It made me realize that some impacts can be negative on myself and the students. I hope that the next time I do this project I will be able to support every student. My goal is to not put pressure on anyone not ready to share. I also hope that in supporting students’ individual needs, I will be more accepting of the level they feel comfortable sharing.
What happens when students share the stories of themselves and others was a winding road leading to an audience. Supporting students along this road was challenging, but the success was getting everyone to the destination. At the end of the road, I recognized that we had come a long way. What I know now has helped me understand what stories kids want to share, what challenges arise as kids find their stories, and the importance of supporting all students at their comfort level. For those who aren’t sure about what to share, it’s important to remember that sharing at all is a big step towards learning to be more open in the future. I’ve learned that setting up a positive community where kids feel safe to share is vital to the process. I know that I need to do better in supporting struggling students. It is not easy to share something personal especially if it brings up painful memories. I hope next time, students can be more self-guided in determining their level of comfort with sharing stories. My hope in the project will continue to be engaging all students to comfortably share an aspect of their personal lives.
In sharing my work with others, I’ve learned that stories can all have a positive and meaningful effect on the storyteller and the audience. It’s important to encourage stories where kids felt good about themselves or successful. It’s also important to help students understand that although bad things happen in life, we learn lessons from them that help us carry on. The most valuable lesson I learned was to encourage student voice and give students a creative medium through which to express it. I hope their stories continue to make positive impacts on the people that watch them and learn from them.
My journey ends only to begin again. Now that I’ve learned how to use digital storytelling in my classroom and examined what happens, I hope to engage others to try it as I make steps to refine my project and try it again. Although it is a personal journey for anyone who attempts it, we can learn from each other about the insights we gained. As a teacher leader and researcher, I hope that my experience inspires others to learn about their students using digital storytelling. By having conversations with our kids and hearing what they have to say about their lives, I hope that we can encourage a new level of self-expression and comfort in the classroom. Together, I feel that we have the ability as teachers to make a positive difference by sharing our experiences and learning about our students’ lives. In the end, may many voices fill our hearts and souls as we encourage the creative practice of sharing our life experiences through digital storytelling!
