Tell us about your story

The forms of storytelling are varied from traditional oral narratives from up-to-date storytelling via interactive media or digital tools and technologies, which is also called digital storytelling. According to Wikipedia, digital storytelling refers to "a short form of digital media production that allows everyday people to share aspects of their life story". An effective digital storytelling incorporates elements of text, video, audio, music and pictures, and can be interactive.

The digital storytelling is also pedagogically applicable. It is a powerful tool for instruction and consolidation of course content for teachers. Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling suggests that teachers could use it to present new materials by creating new stories, and, in so doing, to motivate students in engaging learning activities and exploring new ideas and topics. In addition, since some of the teachers may find it is difficult to perfectly integrating multi-media into their instruction, storytelling is a good way of consolidating course content by making abstract concepts more concrete and by involving students into discussion. Besides, digital storytelling can be an effective learning tool for students. Through creating their own story, students will develop communication skills such as to “organize their ideas, ask questions, express opinions, and construct narratives”. What’s more, they will gain valuable experience by researching a topic and then choosing a particular point of view. Also, a collaboration work on digital storytelling provides a platform for students to learn learning styles from each other and to share learning resources.

Except for the pedagogical means to use digital storytelling mentioned above, it also benefits me in my future teaching. Firstly, it is a pool of cultures that students share with each other. Students, through first person narrative, would identify salient features from their own cultures, arrange materials at hand, tell their story and demonstrate to others. In the storytelling process, students’ cultural identities are gradually established; by being exposed in dynamic culture contexts, students will experience authentic cultures in this way. Secondly, digital storytelling is used as a reflection of students’ learning experience. When students are asked to think about their identities as language learners, they are required to trace back what they did to contribute to language learning process. In doing so, teachers and students will gain a knowledge of their cognitive development in language area, which enables teachers to provide feedback for their future learning and allows students to see personal ownership and accomplishment.