These are the slides of the presentation given by Mohamed Aboul Ela in the 20th NileTESOl Conference. The main theme of the conference was "Best Practices in TESOL: Communicate, Collaborate, Create."This presentation implements digital technology in the classroom to enhance students' language skills, mainly speaking skills through doing projects, of which the final product is a digital story instead of a mundane report.

1. Mohamed Aboul Ela Abdel MageedMohamed Aboul Ela Abdel Mageed
mabouelela@zewailcity.edu.egmabouelela@zewailcity.edu.eg

2. 
Agenda
Digital storytelling projects
Advantages
Students’ speaking skills
Rationale
Assessment
Challenges
Example

4. 
 This questions can be divided into two sub-questions:
 What is a project?
A planned set of interrelated tasks to be executed over a fixed period and
within certain cost and other limitations. (Business Dictionary)
 What is digital storytelling (DST)?
The practice of combining still images with a narrated soundtrack including
both voice and music (Robin, 2008).
What are DST Projects?

5. 
 Open-ended investigations intended to foster -----------inquiry
and ----------thinking while students work toward
---------possible resolutions to --------challenges. Students present
their ideas in the form of --------stories.
Enhancing – authentic – digital – producing –critical –deep
So what are DST Projects?

6. 
 Open-ended investigations intended to foster deep inquiry and
----------thinking while students work toward ---------possible
resolutions to --------challenges. Students present their ideas in
the form of --------stories.
Enhancing – authentic – digital – producing –critical –deep
So what are DST Projects?

7. 
 Open-ended investigations intended to foster deep inquiry and
critical thinking while students work toward ---------possible
resolutions to --------challenges. Students present their ideas in
the form of --------stories.
Enhancing – authentic – digital – producing –critical –deep
So what are DST Projects?

8. 
 Open-ended investigations intended to foster deep inquiry and
critical thinking while students work toward producing
possible resolutions to --------challenges. Students present their
ideas in the form of --------stories.
Enhancing – authentic – digital – producing –critical –deep
So what are DST Projects?

9. 
 Open-ended investigations intended to foster deep inquiry and
critical thinking while students work toward producing
possible resolutions to authentic challenges. Students present
their ideas in the form of --------stories.
Enhancing – authentic – digital – producing –critical –deep
So what are DST Projects?

10. 
 Open-ended investigations intended to foster deep inquiry and
critical thinking while students work toward producing
possible resolutions to authentic challenges. Students present
their ideas in the form of digital stories.
So what are DST Projects?

11. 
The Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy

12. Video
Voice
Photo
Music
Digital Stories
Text

13. 1. Point of view: the main point
2. Dramatic question: the key question
3. Emotional content: writing that will take hold of audience
4. The gift of your voice: narration of the text
5. Soundtrack: thoughtfully selected sounds and music
6. Economy: a small number of images or video and a fairly short text
7. Pacing: the rhythm of a story and how slowly or quickly it moves
Joe Lambert coined the Seven Elements of
Effective Digital Stories (2007, p. 9- 19):

14. 
About Digital Stories
 From individual to collective narratives
 For novice to advanced learners
 From text, audio to video files
 From 2-3 to 10-20 minute long
 From CD to web publishing

16. 
Why Digital Storytelling?
Storytelling – We love to HEARHEAR stories
Digital media – We love to SEESEE stories
Social media – We love to TELLTELL stories
Web publishing – We love to SHARESHARE stories

17. Power of
Digital Media

18. 
How to create digital stories?
Five Steps
(1) Write your story: drafting, revising and proofreading
(2) Find images, sound, audio/video clips
Use of “Creative Commons” site; copyright issues
(3) Create a storyboard: Planning a visual story
(4) Select a digital tool to record your story
“Photo Story 3”
(5) Share your story (e.g., YouTube)

19. Scene 1 Scene 2 Scene 3
Narration
Sound
Music
Narration
Sound
Music
Narration
Sound
Music
Sound
Music

20. 
Software
 PC
Photo Story 3
Movie Maker
 Mac
iMovie
 Other tools
Audacity (audio only)

21. Photo Story 3

22. TechnologyTechnology
IntegrationIntegration Reflection
Project-Based
Learning
Diagram by Barrett (2006)
Student
Engagement
Digital
Storytelling

23. 
Digital Stories for L2 Learners
• Put students at the centre of learning process
• Allow self-expression and creativity
• Enhance language skills; writing and speaking
• Use 21st
century skills: digital literacy; self-direction;
problem solving

24. 
Ohler (2008) states that due to the “interplay between writing,
speaking, and listening, digital story telling has great potential to
help students learn language” (p. 51).
DST Projects & Speaking Skills

25. 
The rationale
1. Write a project challenge that requires deep levels of
inquiry.
2. Tailor the challenge to your students’ needs.
3. Students investigate the challenge and propose
a resolution.
4. Students create their digital stories.
5. They present their digital stories to the class.
6. Rubrics are used to assess DSs
7. Teacher-student interview

26. 
Assessment
 Digital storytelling Rubric
 Teacher-student interview
 Peer-assessment
 Reflection

27. 
Challenges
 Time Management
 Technology
 Engagement

29. Resources
Edutopia
http://www.edutopia.org/project-based-learning-getting-started-resources
How to Create Simple Digital Stories:
http://electronicportfolios.com/digistory/howto.html
A sample storyboard
http://www.printablepaper.net/category/storyboard

30. References
Lambert, J. (2007). Digital storytelling cookbook. Retrieved June 23,
2009, from http://www.storycenter.org/cookbook.pdf
Ohler, J. (2008). Digital storytelling in the classroom: New media
pathways to literacy, learning, and creativity. Thousand Oaks,
CA: Corwin Press.
Robin, B. R. (2008). Digital storytelling: A powerful technology tool for
the 21st century classroom. Theory Into Practice, 47, 220-228.
http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/project.html

32. mabouelela@zewailcity.edu.egmabouelela@zewailcity.edu.eg