Tag Archives: digital storytelling

A Walk Down Memory Lane With Google Street View

I came across a post by @dougpete entitled “My Childhood Community”. He used Google Street View to take a virtual walk down memory lane. My head started spinning because I saw a student assignment in this. After just finishing an immigration unit as well as a project called “What’s Your Story”, I was thinking that this was the perfect opportunity to tap into some 21st Century skills while connecting with adults. I imagined my students sitting in front of a laptop with a parent or grandparent and asking them about where they grew up. The child would then show them using Google Street View the places they were speaking of. As the conversation developed, the tool would be used as a virtual treasure hunt where the two generations would be exploring, sparking memories, and learning from each other. They will be able to talk about changes in childhood, buildings, and technology. What a recipe for a meaningful conversation!

I have not started this with my students yet, but have created directions for the project here. Even if I don’t have time to fit this in for this current year, I have learned how to use Google in a way that I’ve never thought of before. Digital storytelling has become an integral part of my language arts curriculum, and this is just another extension to it.

This past week, I sat with my mom as we talked about my childhood. I showed her what I was doing on Google Street View and she was amazed at the technology! We spent about an hour reminiscing and exploring our little town and the surrounding areas. It truly was a great conversation and walk down memory lane. I see her every day, but don’t always have the opportunity to connect in the way we did this week. Here we are just before my first birthday…I was just beginning to walk…

Below are the examples that I made from that discussion with my mom:

Thanks to @dougpete for sharing your experience, and a special thanks to my mom that walked with me through my childhood, and continues to walk with me every day.

So, what do you believe?

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On January 25th, I began the process of teaching 8th graders how to write a “This I Believe” essay in 350-500 words. It seemed like a simple task until I realized the magnitude of what I was asking them to discover about themselves, in addition to being able to share that information with me. Although I can’t share the essays with you, I have created a video with true belief statements extracted from the original pieces. I hope this will inspire you to ask yourself what you believe in…go ahead…ask your students, too!

These are the original slides that we created the video from:

Teaching the Holocaust using 21st Century Skills

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Two years ago, I was fortunate enough to be trained in Holocaust Education through Facing History and Ourselves. At the time, I had no idea how that program would change so much of my program. If you ever get a chance to be involved with the organization, it is an amazing experience!

Since then, I’ve created a year-long 8th grade research project, make.a.difference, in which students choose a person or organization that has made a positive difference in the world. Facing History uses the Holocaust as a catalyst for teaching tolerance as well as choosing to participate in order to make the world a better place.

In 7th grade, I’ve created a rich Holocaust Education experience involving film, literature, short stories, poems, and graphic novels. I challenged my 7th graders to research a survivor or upstander from the Holocaust to remember. They used imovie and photostory to create a digital story about their person. The end result was powerful, meaningful, and moving. Click here to view all of their amazing creations!

My diigo list of Holocaust resources.

Flickrpoet: Digital Storytelling Gets Poetic

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I’ve been using digital storytelling with my students via photostory, but this takes digital storytelling to another level. Flickrpoet allows you to enter a sentence, a poem, lyrics, etc. into the text box, which, in turn, will create a visual representation of your work in pictures pulled from Flickr. Imagine the possibilities for students!