A Story Among Many

A Story Among Many,

from Digital Is...

by Christina Cantrill

Renee Webster, a teacher consultant at the Red Cedar Writing Project, has an ongoing inquiry as a teacher of young students. How can she best support her students in hearing their own “smart thinking” as well as that of their classmates and friends? Over the years she has supported the sharing of “smart thinking” among students through having students work together and contribute to group conversations about a range of subjects, including literature and their own storytelling.

At one point she introduced digital recorders to further support students in their work. The recorders turned out to have a profound effect on the literacy practices of the students. This success was because of the ease of use for both recording and repeated listening, as well as the expanded audiences to which they could now share. Flip cameras soon followed, allowing students to further record and share their work and eventually inspire one group of first graders to conceive and create a documentary about first grade for the incoming class from kindergarten.

They knew that their voices mattered.

Renee knew this too. And so when she was asked to share some of the work she had been doing in her classroom she decided to use these same media tools and approaches and make a short video called "HearingStudent Voices," which includes her own inquiry questions and a view into her classroom through images and the recorded narratives of her students.

Robert Rivera-Amezola, a third and fourth grade teacher at Willard Elementary in Philadelphia, was inspired by “Hearing Student Voices” in making his own short film, “Service Learning, Technology and English LanguageLearners,” which highlights the significance of supporting student learning through project-based and service oriented work. Like Renee’s students, Robert’s used and created digital media that amplified their messages while requiring collaborative composition to complete. Robert talks about how “they discovered more about themselves and built a strong community of learners” and that this proved to be invaluable, especially for the English language learners who comprised the majority of his classroom.

Both of these videos are now part of an emerging collection of ideas, reflections and questions about what it means to teach writing in our increasingly digital world on the Digital Is website, launched by the National Writing Project in November 2010.

Digital Is is an open website supporting the exploration of work and inquiries by educators across the grade levels, both inside and outside of schooling, who are exploring digital literacies and related practice with their students. “Writing today,” say the authors of Because Digital Writing Matters, “is pervasively and generally digital; composed with digital tools; created out of word, image, sound and motion; circulated in digital environments; and consumed across and wide range of digital platforms.” Therefore the website was created explicitly to support the sharing of work among educators in the emerging field of literacy and digital media, to encourage discussions about this work among an expanded community, as well as to provide important evidence of the visionary, innovative and dedicated work and approaches that educators bring to their professional practice inside and outside of school.

Digital Is is curated by writing project colleagues. Curators pull together resources made by educators into collections that can support conversations across examples of work and practice. Resources within Digital Is are not all video – many are text-based with hyperlinks and images, some are podcasts and several integrate tools like Voicethreads to show and invite comments. However, what all the resources and collections within this website have in common is the belief in the power of voice in teaching and learning.

The website is a work in progress and a growing collection. We therefore invite you to participate in Digital Is as an individual and/or within a community at your writing project site. You can participate by browsing the website, joining, and adding to the discussion there or start your own. You can also use the resources in various ways. For example, resources and collections from Digital Is are being used to prompt discussions in face-to-face learning communities that then to connect to discussions shared online too.

You can also become a resource creator within Digital Is. Individuals have been doing this and also site teams have formed that are supporting group inquiry into digital media and learning with the goal to publish emerging work and practice here. Resource creators gain access to drafting and feedback tools that allow you to work on a resource privately and in draft form, and then request or give feedback to others working on resources too.

We would love to learn from you how you could imagine this website and its resources and collections being useful to you and your local writing project practices.n

Learn more about Digital Is at http://digitalis.nwp.org.

Contributions to Digital Is by PhilWP Teacher Consultants (so far…)

• • “#engchat: community, conversation and collaboration for English teachers”

  • by Meenoo Rami

  • “A Fourth Grade Service Learning Project” by Robert Rivera-Amezola

  • “Reading in a Cloud” by Rita Sorrentino

  • “Google Docs Support Access and Collaboration” by Trey Smith

Additional Highlights from the Digital Is Collection

• • “Lights, Camera, Social Action!” by Katie McKay, Heart of Texas Writing Project

  • A discussion titled “Student Leaders”

  • “Where do I start? Beginning the Digital Journey in the Classroom” collected by Kim Jaxon, Northern California Writing Project

  • “Redefining Text” by Belinda Foster, Area 3 Writing Project

  • A discussion titled “Creativity”

  • “Using Video to Inspire Critical Analysis” by Tracy Lee, Digital Youth Network

  • “Digital Is ... what exactly?” collected by Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, National Writing Project

More Resources on Digital Media and Learning

• • Because Digital Writing Matters http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/books/digitalwritingmatters

  • “Teachers Are the Center of Education: Writing, Learning and Leading in the Digital Age” http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/resource/3154

  • “Copyright Clarity: How Fair Use Supports Digital Learning” http://mediaeducationlab.com/copyright

  • “Digital Literacy and Citizenship Curriculum” http://www.commonsensemedia.org/educators

Christina Cantrill is a senior program associate in national programs and site development with the National Writing Project. Christina was the PhilWP administrative assistant from 1993-1996.

This piece was also posted online at Christina’s new blog, In Community, at seecantrill.tumblr.com.