Digital+Camera

March 3, 2010 Rock Cycle Scrapbook **PhotoStory Student-Created Digital Story**

media type="custom" key="6227503"

Poppin' Power Words **PhotoStory Teacher-Created Digital Story**

media type="file" key="Heat Wave Power Words.flv" width="360" height="270"

**Technology Standards Addressed**

**Technology Standards Addressed** __Maryland Teacher Technology Standards__ V. Integrating Technology into the Curriculum and Instruction 4. Use appropriate instructional strategies for integrating technology into instruction. 5. Select and use appropriate technology to support content-specific student learning outcomes.

__Maryland Technology Literacy Standards for Students__ Standard 4.0 Technology for Communication and Expression B. Expression 1. Use and explain how technology can be used to express ideas a. Use multimedia and publishing tools to express original ideas I created a PhotoStory that introduced the important vocabulary (Power Words) for the story //Heat Wave//. I used this with my students in place of the PowerPoint slide show that I generally use. I took pictures around the classroom and at home to illustrate each of the words. I then added the sentences for each word and recorded myself reading the definitions and sentences.
 * Description**

For the student-created PhotoStory, I had students in my class take pictures of work they had done in science. We were studying the rock cycle, and each student completed independent projects such as board games, crossword puzzles, scrapbooks, and stories. Lexi photographed the artwork she had done for her scrapbook of the "life cycle" of a rock. She then created the Photostory and added her own narration.

**Reflection** Working with PhotoStory has been a new experience for me. There are features that I like and limitations that I don't like. I like the ways that I can edit the photographs right in the PhotoStory. I enjoyed seeing what happened when I changed the colors or texture of the pictures. I also enjoyed the ability to crop the photos quickly. I found recording narration to be easy and a bit fun. However, I felt limited in the ways that I could have the pictures move. I've used PowerPoint to create slideshows many times and I enjoy that I can have more than one picture on a page and move them in and out of the frame.

Lexi enjoyed creating her Photostory and was excited about showing it to the class. It took about an hour spread out over two days to complete the project. She took the pictures and loaded them into the Photostory on the same day. The following day, she added the motions and recorded the narration.

The most difficult part of using this with the students is that I am limited to one computer. I tried having a small group of students working on a PhotoStory, but any student not directly on the computer quickly became bored. I could see myself using this again in the future pairs of students rather than groups.