Ohler's advice regarding "start with what you have" (pg. 166) really struck a cord with me this week. I had felt a bit defeated in past weeks because my school district lacked funding for technology tools that DST would require. However, after creating the two videos for this class, I felt more inspired (and comfortable) to have my students use the free software (Windows Movie Maker) for creating stories of their own. Having spent some time with my students at Science camp taking digital photos of the awesome sights, I suggested them to try out Movie Maker at home to create a slide show with their photos. It would be great practice for students to become familiar with the program.
Although Ohler expressed some negative aspects with the most current Movie Maker in terms of how it's difficult to mix audio within the video, which I wholeheartedly agree with, I found some nice improvements compared to the older versions. The text features in the newer version mimicked Microsoft Word, which made it much easier to add and change fonts. I also appreciated the freedom to manipulate the text in different ways to fit a particular photo. By having this option, I think the flow of a DST can be better explained since you can move the text to where you need it.
Overall, I think Ohler's advice to first use free software programs to create DST will greatly benefit other teachers, as well as myself, to jumpstart digital stories in the classroom.
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