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Katie Berger
Professor Wertz-O
UWRT 1103
18 April 2016
Documentary Reflection
I. Reflecting on digital storytelling
The process to finish the Holocaust Documentary was long and drawn out. We started
with a storyboard to map out our main plan for the documentary. After we had a broad plan, we
began turning that paper into a reality. We did research, found information and pictures to
include, and planned out the more tedious aspects of the assignment. I have done a very similar
project this year in one of my other classes. It was to research the effects of rabies on the human
mind. The project was supposed to more of an acting or creative video, however, my group chose
to go the documentary route. While working on this piece we didnt use that many resources. We
mostly used the internet, and some original Holocaust survivors artwork. I would say since the
bulk of our research was found on scholarly websites through google, which was the most
effective way to do this. Obviously, since it is the internet, I will in fact be using it again.
II. Reflecting on Technology
I was not the technology person for our group (thankfully), and because of this fact, I
dont think I learned anything new, I just used previous knowledge to help do my part. I like to
think that what I was especially good at was sending my group a google slides presentation so
we could all share our work, this being the most complex aspect on the computer I had to
attempt. In my opinion, I can improve on nearly anything computer based. I am not a technology

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guru and can only do the most basic of functions. I myself did not run into any problems
regarding technology.
III. Reflecting on your learning
At the beginning of the project, the only thing I knew about Nazi experimentation was
what I had learned from the two projects that our group presented during the multimodal
presentations. As we dove more in depth, we learned many new things. Creating a documentary
movie is similar to writing in many ways. They follow the same basic procedure: planning,
researching, and putting together a final project. The main difference is the use of pictures and
narration, and the ability to be more creative with it. If the groups were to collaborate on a
traditional paper, I think the end result would be nearly the same learning wise. For example,
what we take away from it would be the same. From another perspective, an audiences
perspective, when showing the final projects to other people, the impact it has on them is more
powerful with a documentary style. The music and picture choice plays a major role in what the
audience takes away. The PowerPoint was especially satisfying to me. The power point was
where we gathered all our information and put it in a neat and organized fashion. Our goals were
very simple, and this remained nearly the same throughout the whole project. We knew exactly
what we wanted to do from the beginning and our goal was to organize and have a moving piece
of work. Our group dynamic was fairly simple, everyone had a job and everyone did their job to
their best potential.
IV. Reflecting on the final product: your documentary
In this final project there was one part I especially liked, and that was the survivor
testimonies. The testimonies were done in a way to allow people to feel for what those people
had to go through, and it gave a reliable source for what really happened in those camps. The

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part that I didnt like about the final project was how fast the narrators spoke. If everyone spoke a
little slower, it would have been more effective and been much closer to 10 minutes. So even
though all the research and information was there, it does not seem like we worked hard on it
because people were speed reading. That was also the most frustrating part for me because I was
not the narrator, but we knew we had to talk slow, and we just didnt get that done quite like I
had hoped. In my opinion, this piece does not really meet my standards. If we had one more day
to meet with our technology guy and help him put it together, we could have made it better, also
we could have made it more our own and more original. My documentary meets the goals of the
assignment because we directed it towards a specific audience, and we conveyed information
that we thought was important for everyone to know.