Digital Storytelling

Embedded within Alberta 's new Social Studies Program of Studies for Grade 4, is the integral belief that: "Stories provide a vital opportunity to bring history to life. Through stories, people share information, values and attitudes about history, culture and heritage. Stories are communicated through legends, myths, creation stories, narratives, oral traditions, songs, music, dance, literature, visual and dramatic arts, traditions, and celebrations. They can include or be supported by biographies, autobiographies, archives, news items, novels or short stories. In social studies, stories provide students with opportunities to understand the dynamics of peoples, cultures, places, issues and events that are integral to Alberta ’s history and to contemporary society."

During the 2006 fall term, 24 EDEL 435 students took on the challenge of learning how digital historical narratives could serve as platform to bring history alive for elementary school students. Most knew little to nothing about the program Window Movie Maker or Microsoft PhotoStory and all had much to learn about the lengthy, often frustrating process of obtaining permission to use archived photos and sounds files. The day the students unveiled their projects we all realized that in the absence of a defined model to follow, students had been freed to create their own definition of what a digital historical narrative looked like and how it could be used to introduce elementary school students to the sometimes hidden stories from Canadian history.

STUDENT COMMENTS:

"It became apparent we were creating a narrative describing a time and place using the clues left to us by history"......"I realize there is more to history than what bores us silly in textbooks- there are voices, people, places and things unlike any before or since. Hidden in the shadows of these dusty phantoms are the lives of those who came before us, so that we might be here now.".	"I realize there is more to history than what bores us silly in textbooks- there are voices, people, places and things unlike any before or since. Hidden in the shadows of these dusty phantoms are the lives of those who came before us, so that we might be here now."
"This project helped me think outside the "book"- I hope to pass that onto my students."	"The roadblocks we encountered helped to narrow what voices we wanted to use out of the extensive list of characters who were present at Treaty 7."

Here are a sampling of projects from EDEL 435 (fall, 2006):

The Frank Slide

The Lost Lemon Mine

Alberta

The Great Depression

Residential Schools

Treaty 7

I Remember: War War Two