Category: scholarship response

INTE 5340 Final Portfolio

IMG_1103Wow! I feel like I’ve come to the end of a long journey. Back in January, I had no idea where my Learning With Digital Stories (INTE 5340) class would take me. I’ve gone down different paths this semester and seen many things and read many stories of adversity. In the process, I’ve been inspired to create my own digital story. The above photo of an old pair of hiking shoes was part of that personal story. I wore them for two summers working outdoor events at the Denver Botanic Gardens in Chatfield. During that time, I faced a number of job-related challenges, from 100 degree temperatures to short-tempered wedding guests! Much like that work experience, I’ve overcome a number of obstacles this semester to better understand the world of digital storytelling and how this form of personal expression can benefit individuals, including myself, who wish to discuss the adversity they have faced in their lives.

Chapter Readings:

I came to enjoy reading chapters of Joe Lambert’s book Digital Storytelling: Capturing Lives, Creating Community. The first chapter became the catalyst for my interest in Lambert’s work. Chapter 3 gave me some insight on the long path that Lambert took and the talented people he collaborated with to establish the Center for Digital Storytelling (now StoryCenter) in Berkeley, California. Finally, Chapter 5 gave me an idea of how Lambert and his colleagues at StoryCenter facilitate the creation of digital stories with the authors. I was able to use this chapter as a resource when I created my own digital story about my adversity during my job search. All this insight was made possible when our instructor, Clinical Associate Professor Lori Elliott, gave us the option to read the Lambert chapters (and other readings) in place of our initial assigned text for the semester. It was a welcome change of pace.

Chapter 1: “The Work of Story”

Chapter 3: “A Road Traveled”

Chapter 5: “Seven Steps of Digital Storytelling”

Scholarship Responses:

In addition to the assigned readings, there were a number of articles on the World Wide Web that gave me a better idea of digital storytelling’s impact in society and how it can help people tell their stories regarding adversity. In my alma mater’s alumni magazine, I found an article about how digital storytelling was helping Veteran Administration doctors learn more details about their patients. A fellow classmate, Darren Blackman, commented on how a storytelling project such as that can be “a great way to keep patience(s) as humans not data.” Plus, I discovered a news item from the University of Michigan-Flint about how a $100,000 grant to fund the cleanup of Flint’s contaminated water supply included money to teach local students digital storytelling skills so they can describe what they had been going through during the environmental crisis.

“Story Time”

Digital Storytelling and the Flint Water Crisis

Digital Story Critiques

There was a rich variety of audio and video narratives to view on the internet. StoryCorps offered many examples of people overcoming adversity, including a soldier coping with the death of his comrades (a peer, Alicia Newton, shared this with others on Twitter) as well as a pair of African-American stuntmen confronting racism in Hollywood.  Many of my classmates also found insightful audiovisual narratives on this site as well.  Another website with a wealth of digital stories was, of course, StoryCenter. At the site that Joe Lambert helped build, there were a number of adversity narratives, from a young Pakistani woman challenging cultural traditions by going to college (also critiqued by fellow classmate Kristin Vossler) to an Asian-American conscientious objector during the Vietnam War. Closer to my home in Denver, I found a couple of local digital stories on the American Graduate website, include one young man’s struggle to turn his life around. Each of these unique compositions gave me a perspective of not only how digital storytelling can visualize the concept of adversity, but also how I might be able to express my struggles during my job search over the last 10 plus years.

“1st Squad, 3rd Platoon”

Willie Harris and Alex Brown

“Opening Doors”

“To Be or Not To Be”

“Elisha’s Story”

DS106 Assignments:

These (almost) weekly DS106 projects helped me explore new ways to tell a story either in a couple of hours or in a couple of days. At times, it was challenging to both come up with an idea as well as the best application to utilize in the creation of the assignment. For many of the Daily Creates, I had to think and act (relatively) fast to produce results in Adobe Photoshop, such as these:

“The Words of Shakespeare”

“Old West Wisdom Sayings”

For the Assignment Bank projects, I used a variety of tools, including iMovie, SoundCloud and Vimeo, to create and present an assortment of digital creations.  The last hyperlink listed was easy to record, but it was perhaps the most personal project I completed.

“10 Second Song Mashup”

Motivational Poster

Dear Sixteen Year Old Me

Weekly Reflection:

Every few weeks, it felt good to write down how I was progressing in the course.  Most of the time, I discussed about what I was learning about digital storytelling, but after week 7, I decided to reflect on how a chapter in Joe Lambert’s book was making me think about what I was learning about myself.  Afterwards, it was great to hear such positive feedback from Kristin and Lori about my thoughts.

“Getting Farther Away From the Campfire”

My Digital Story:

All of these readings, articles, blog postings and creative assignments inspired me to compose my own digital story about my adversity during my job search. I choose to put together a montage of still images featuring items or articles of clothing from jobs in my past. With a little music and narration, I was able to tell a story of the rugged career path I have taken over these many years.

“Mementos of Adversity”

So, I’ve come to the end of my journey this semester in Learning with Digital Stories. I’d like to thank my peers in this class for their critiques and comments as well as our instructor, Lori Elliott, for her guidance, energy and encouragement.

Sincerely,

Mark Hahm

Future (2017?) M.A. graduate from the Information and Learning Technologies (with emphasis in eLearning Design and Implementation) program from UC-Denver

Scholarship Response: “Moving Pictures”

1024px-Austin_Hall,_Harvard_University(By Daderot (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) or CC BY-SA 2.5-2.0-1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5-2.0-1.0)], via Wikimedia Commons)

This week, as I was conducting a Google search for the words “digital storytelling” and “education”, I came across a recent article from the website Harvard Law Today.  The article, “Moving Pictures”, discusses how law students are using documentary film making and digital storytelling to tell important stories about injustice.  One student interviewed is Sam Koplewicz, who heads an organization called the Harvard Law Documentary Studio.  He comments, “I think film moves us and interacts with us in a way that writing can’t.”  Koplewicz visited a refugee camp in Greece and interviewed young children through barbed-wire fences.  The Harvard Law Documentary Studio, or “Doc Studio” for short, has participants produce six films a year.  Another student, Andrea Clay, is creating a documentary on the development and utilization of the Socratic method in the education of law.  Other topics addressed by student filmmakers include gentrification, religion and political refugees.  Near the end of the article, there is an interview with a filmmaker and Harvard Law School lecturer named Rebecca Richman Cohen, who teaches courses in digital storytelling and documentary film.  She comments on how video recordings can help attorneys in arguing cases of clients that are located in remote places.  “Video lets lawyers bring clients’ voices directly to policymakers, judges, and mainstream media… it can expose corruption and law violations … and enhance public understanding of the law” she says.

It’s remarkable how the power of digital storytelling can be utilized by anyone with the right amount of determination and production skill.  To have young legal minds at one of the United States’ most prestigious law schools embrace that power is quite remarkable.

 

 

Scholarly Response: Digital Storytelling and the Flint Water Crisis

um-water-research-540x360This week, I found an interesting article from the University of Michigan-Flint regarding the topic of digital storytelling. The community of Flint, Michigan received over $100,000 in seed money to fund various projects in the clean-up of Flint’s contaminated water supply. In addition to long-term projects aimed at solving the city’s infrastructure, there will be funding set aside to teaching journalism and digital storytelling skills to Flint-area students during a summer class on environmental issues. Instructors from UM-Flint, UM-Dearborn, UM-Ann Arbor, and Genesse Early College will collaborate on the project.  According to Jeremy Allen at UM Public Affairs, “teachers will assist the students in producing digital stories describing their own and others’ experiences in Flint during the past months.”

With much of the mainstream media covering the presidential race, it’s hard to find any coverage lately on the impact of civic disasters like the one going on in Flint. Lead poisoning by a careless corporation is one thing, but lead poisoning as a result of lazy government oversight is another. Getting the perspectives of Flint citizens who have been impacted by this health crisis could give digital storytelling some greater visibility and credibility.

Scholarly Response: “Story Time”

Recently, I was skimming through On Wisconsin, the alumni magazine from my alma mater, the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  In addition to articles about noteworthy alumni, there are often stories about professors and students conducting innovating research projects on the Madison campus.  One such article, “Story Time”, detailed a unique storytelling project involving UW students and military veterans at a Madison-area Veterans Administration (VA) hospital.  The project, called “My Life, My Story“, was initiated in 2013 by a UW School of Medicine and Public Health psychiatry resident and has since been adopted by six other VA facilities across the country.  The program gives veterans an opportunity to tell their stories about what they have gone through in military and civilian life.  A volunteer, usually a medical or literature student, acts as an interviewer and writes a 1000-word story.  This personal testomony enables a health care provider, such as a VA doctor or nurse, to better understand the background of a patient.  The article gives some enlightening examples of patients telling their stories and students commenting on the significance of the project.

It’s a remarkable how storytelling can help people discuss about the adversity they have encountered in their lives.  In cases such as this, it enables medical professionals to look at something other than a chart to get a better picture of a patient’s history.  Especially if a patient has put his or her life in harm’s way.

Scholarly Response: “Why Your Department Needs Social Media”

Every now and then, I like to check out educational “trade” publications for articles on the pros and cons of new technology in the classroom.  On The Chronicle of Higher Education, I found a piece by Rachel Herrmann entitled “Why Your Department Needs Social Media.”  Herrmann,  a Ph.D. lecturer at the University of Southampton in England, gives a faculty member’s perspective on the best ways for instructors to utilize applications such as Facebook and Twitter to better communicate with students.

Herrmann gives some very concrete first-hand examples of how using social media enables her to post information about upcoming events, announce details regarding grants and share photos of faculty-student social functions.  Likewise, she mentions how students give her feedback about their accomplishments and receive live-Tweets of major lectures and recruitment-day information sessions.  Herrmann does admit that there are a number of university policies and administrative oversights that slow down the process of establishing a faculty social media presence.  She goes on to offer several suggestions (fewer rules, a department social media manager, etc) to make the overall process more efficient.

After reading this article, I thought about what many of the students I have talked to in the Student Success Center at the Community College of Denver have mentioned regarding communicating with their instructors.  Few to none of these students mention their instructors connecting with them on any social media platform whatsoever.  In addition, many of the students say they have, at times, a difficult time getting a simple email response from their instructors regarding an assignment question.  I realize many of the instructors are temporary/part-time adjuncts who can only commit so much of their time for the amount of money they receive for their efforts.  Plus, both instructors and students are entitled to a certain amount of privacy.

Social media can be an effective tool of group communication, but that effectiveness is dependent on the pro-active engagement of all the people in the group.  Maybe things are different in England, but I’m sure here in the United States, educators want to find the best ways to reach their students.  Just not 24/7.