Nice to Meet You…

How do you like me so far?

This was my dad’s big opener at many a soiree. Many a polite party guest would just smile and nod, and say, “hahah, fine….” I wonder how it would have gone if the feedback he got was anonymous or open-ended?

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Well. It might have hurt his feelings.

Poll Everywhere is a polling tool (no duh), where users can let you know what they really think without looking you in the eye. Or while ALL of them look you in the eye. Wouldn’t that be a fun party trick? If you can handle the truth, why not poke Poll Everywhere into your pocket to take to your next big party?

Or… might it be a great way to engage your students?

No duh it would.

This’ll Blow Your Socks Off

Let me preface what I’m about to say by getting all Oracle in your face. This is the future: younow

Nod to the actual Oracle, the lovely, Sacha DeVoretz for bringing younow into my mental hemisphere at her super-fun blogging course.

NOTE: It is NOT a YouTube spinoff. younow takes JenniCam to a whole ‘nother level and is actually pretty creepy from a GenXr’s perspective.

I can see it’s obvious instructional uses, like showing people how to rebuild their chainsaw in time for Halloween, but seriously? It’s a little weird. AND. I think it would be so boring to use it in a lecturey kind of way. So, I’m curious…would you use this tool? What are some ways you could get creative with it?

Peace Owt Peeps.

Digital Stories are Cool. Am I Right?

There is a metric TON of info coming at us all the time and as you probably already know, we use narrative to make sense of stuff. It’s a way we cope with overload and get the heebeegeebees out of our guts (Alexander, 2011).

So what is a digital story? Well, they are a little like a swiss army knife. In their best form they should be multimodal, meaning there are different methods and media used to communicate the message. A digital story should be short, about two minutes or so. The content should have a specific focus and there should be a dramatic arc, just like any good book has (Chase, 2016).The content should be emotional and personal to the creator. What it doesn’t have to contain is the truth (Alexander, 2011; Chase, 2016). Muwahahahaha…..the possibilities are endless.

 

I think digital storytelling is the funnest thing a teacher could bring into the adult classroom and I think that to know one is to do one. Try creating your own digital story. Why not make one for others to use as a resource or simply to explore something going on in your own life? TALK about a good time. Am I right?

Alexander, B. (2011). The new digital storytelling: Creating narratives with new media. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO. Retrieved from http://www.viu.eblib.com.ezproxy.viu.ca/patron/FullRecord.aspx?p=678297&echo=1&userid=jXCORa5oP4U%3d&tstamp=1465009867&id=042FB0AF3910A896CC0C4F21B94F762C8C31259A

Chase, D. (2016). Digital Composition, Storytelling & Multimodal Literacy: What Is Digital Composition & Digital Literacy? Retrieved June 7, 2016, from http://guides.library.stonybrook.edu/digital-storytelling