Digital Story Telling for Class
I use the digital story-telling software by Animoto (http://animoto.com) for academic purposes in my college global history course. Some of the short videos are ones of my creation to review course material. Others are constructed by the students to tell a short video story about a history topic of importance to them. Go to the Animoto web site, http://animoto.com, to learn more about the software and how other educators are using it from elementary through college.
Instructor-created digital stories for the classroom
These videos are based on my college class PP lecture slides. I export the Microsoft PP show into JPEG format. PP creates a new folder with each individual slide turned into a separate JPEG image which I upload into Animoto to create the digital story.
Between WWI and WWII: Intermission Before Increased Death and Destruction
The Cold War of the 20th Century: Human Existence at the Brink of Destruction
Re-Emergence of Africa After Centuries of Domination by the Europeans
South Asia with Birth of Pakistan from india and the Genocide that Follows
Southeast Asia as Frontlines of the Cold War Between the US and Russia
Globalism and Exploitation of People on an International Scale
Student-created digital stories for the classroom
These were created by students in my global studies course to share a history topic of personal importance. On average, videos required between one and two hours to complete using Animoto. This is a sample of videos produced over the past decade. I received permission from some of the students to integrate their video into a future class session the next academic term to preview the lecture topic or conclude a lecture with a dramatic final video. Students responded so powerfully to the videos that were created by their classmates. One semester I screened them (it was a voluntary activity so all students did not participate). Then, the class pretended it was the Oscars and voted on the best. No doubt, the top learning event in the class for many of them.
Alice Paul and the Women's Suffrage Movement The song came from Disney's Mary Poppins. This topic of Women's Rights is an oft overlooked subplot ot the movie.was a subplot in the movie for the mother.
Eric Clapton Through the Years This is an example of an Animoto created to fulfill assignment in another course after creating it in Animoto for this history course.
World War One: The Inevitable War I consider this the most sophisticated and thoughtful of all the student-created videos. The story is real and the music is from a professional recording artist. This video took much longer than two hours to complete but the student found it tremendously meaningful to her.
World War Two The second most numerous of Animoto videos were created to remember events and sacrifices of men and women during World War Two.
The P-51 Mustang WWII Fighter Aircraft Notice the dedication at the end of the video in honor of the student's grand uncle that piloted the P-51 during WWII.
The Yalta Conference in early 1945 Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin met to decide the fate of the world after World War Two. This was the second of three meetings.
WWII Comfort Women of Japan During WWII, Japan captured women from South Korea and forced them to work in brothels as sex slaves. Only in the past few years has Japan recognized this tragedy and made reparation payments to the surviving families.
The Holocaust: WWII and The Holocaust (Graphic Images) The most frequent topic for the students was the Holocaust and other genocides for this Animoto extra credit project. This collection only provides a sample of the videos created by the students. Recent immigrant students from SE Asia often completed projects of the genocides in Cambodia and Vietnam. Some of the students reported it was personally important for them to honor the deaths of relatives lost during those events. As painful as it was to complete the project, they were highly satisfied.
The Holocaust: WWII Children and Auschwitz Nazi Death Camp (Graphic Images)
Revolution Day January 25 in Egypt This celebrates the Egyptian "Arab Spring" democracy protest. The student and his older brother appear in one of the photos.