Digital Storytelling with iMovie on an iPad

Recently, I gave a presentation to a colleague’s class about digital storytelling.  Dr. Rick Kerper is a children’s literature expert and he and I have been collaborating on different digital storytelling projects over the last few years.  This summer, the Middle School Journal even published an article about one of our projects. The article discusses how digital storytelling can be a vital instructional tool to help reach middle school students and we featured a recent Millersville graduate who is creating YouTube videos to teach mathematics through short amusing stories.

When I speak to classes about digital storytelling, I try to focus more on the storytelling aspect than the digital component.   I usually provide an overview of the elements of digital storytelling and walk students through the basic process of creating a digital story.  I discuss making a script and a storyboard and avoid introducing software at all.  This is an overt decision on my part.  I’d rather have strong stories that lack technical pop than some flashy production that lacks a good story.  If you want an overview of the presentation, you can check out my blog post from a few years ago.

Near the end of my presentation to Rick’s class, one of Rick’s students asked if he could make a digital story on his iPad.  I explained that he needs to check out iMovie for iPad and that it would be perfect for digital storytelling.  Coming in at $4.99, iMovie for iPad (and the iPhone) is a tremendous bargain.  It’s a powerful tool that allows users to capture, edit and produce videos all from a single device (an iPad 2).  With iMovie for iPad, users can add basic transitions, music and titles and then share their production through YouTube if they choose.  Some users, however, may miss the bells and whistles that are available in other video editing applications.  I actually find that iMovie for iPad provides all of the tools you need to make a strong digital story, without giving you tons of effects that could distract the viewer from your story.  I don’t miss the lack of a starburst effect or the spiral transition.  Much like the annoying effects in PowerPoint, I find some of the traditional video editing effects and transitions to be quite annoying.  With iMovie for iPad, the story takes center stage, which is exactly where it should be.

To see iMovie for iPad in action, be sure to check out this tutorial:

Telling stories digitally

This week, I’m focusing on digital storytelling as an alternative assessment tool that instructors can use in both online or face-to-face environments.  Instead of assigning a paper or giving an exam, consider having your students create digital stories as a means of assessing student learning.  For instance, Dr. Richard Kerper, a professor in the Elementary and Early Childhood Education department at Millersville, has his students create short movie trailers for books they read.  Not only is he able to evaluate the students on what they’ve learned from their reading, he is able to tap into the students’ creativity and engage them by using technology.   By having his students post their products online and share them with the other members of the class, Dr. Kerper also fosters a community wear the students can learn from one another and revise their work based on peer feedback.

While there are many different points of view regarding what constitutes a digital story, I think the most important aspect to remember is that digital stories tell a story digitally.  I know that sounds sort of elementary but it’s easy to lose sight of the story when the software is complicated or offers many bells and whistles.  Each semester, I have students who create elaborate digital stories that contain all sorts of special effects but the stories themselves are weak.  I’m sure you’ve had similar experiences with books or movies.  A fancy cover isn’t going to improve the quality of a story and special effects won’t hide poor storytelling.  Even though most moviemaking software offer different ways to creatively alter and display the video, keep in mind that the goal is good storytelling.  The digital component is just the medium.

I know that digital storytelling is new for some people so I’m using this space to share some tutorials I created for my students as well as links to tutorials on different movie making software (iMovie & MovieMaker).

Some additional resources:

The Digital Storytelling Cookbook
How to Use Digital Storytelling in Your Classroom

iMovie Resources:
iMovie 06 Tutorial iMovie 08 Tutorial iMovie 09 Tutorial
iMovie 06 Manual iMovie 08 Manual

Moviemaker Resources:
Moviemaker XP Tutorial
Moviemaker Vista Tutorial
Moviemaker Community Help Page