Digital Storytelling Night Lesson Plan

Overview: Families and students are invited to come to our digital storytelling
night. This year, all who attend will bring artifacts that are important to them.
Please have the students bring 3-5 artifacts from home that are meaningful to
them or their family. We will use these artifacts to create a digital story about them
using Voicethread (iMovie as a backup tool in case of internet problems).
Voicethread and iMovie are Apps that are available on our classroom iPads. This
lesson was sent home a week in advance with details on how to use these tools.
This felt like an efficient way to save time. Families can gain help throughout the
week or during the session.

Subject Digital Storytelling Night

Grade Level 2nd

Materials iPhones, iPads, Tablets, Chromebooks

Objectives The purpose of this assignment is to connect students and

their families through digital storytelling tools. Family
involvement is vital to student success. They will be able to
share intimate items and artifacts to their families and
themselves.

New York Kindergarten Writing Standards: ​Text Types and Purposes

State Next KW2: Use a combination of drawing, dictating, oral expression,
Generation and/or emergent writing to name a familiar topic and supply
ELA information.
Standards
KW4: Create a response to a text, author, or personal experience
(e.g., dramatization, art work, or poem).

KSL4: Describe familiar people, places, things, and events with

detail.

Teaching Timeline
Step 1 Arrival and Setup (4:00-5:00 arrival)
Parents should arrive at Memorial Elementary School library at 5 pm. I
will arrive at 4 pm to set up the tables with iPads, and Tablets with the
app VoiceThread downloaded on them for students and their families.
There will be a paper near every piece of technology for the parents to
sign out along with the paper they broad with an explanation to their
family artifacts. This assignment was given out a week before in
preparation to tonight to be more proactive with parental time.

Step 2 Opening (5:10-5:30)

Students and families will arrive and sign in with their names and
contact number. Everyone will have a seat at one of the tables we have
set up in the library. Each table will hold at least 3 families. I will
introduce myself and thank all the people who have joined us. I will then
invite families if they are interested in sharing their artifacts with a
neighbor at their table. After everyone shares their artifacts, I will begin
explaining the instructions for the activity or they can look to the paper I
provided.

Step 3 Sorting and Ordering: (5:30-6:00)

Students will lay out their artifacts on the table. I will have them watch
the monitor in the cafeteria as I “screen-mirror” my own sample of a
digital storytelling. I will use my iPad to mirror my screen onto the
monitor for all to see. This is only a replay because prior parents were
sent home with details on how to create the voice thread and their
artifact showing. I will show my example and explain how the items I
chose are important in my life. I will direct everybody to sort their
artifacts into categories or groups that would flow nicely in a digital
story.

Step 4 Pre-scripting:(6:00-6:30)
Double check that all families and students have a template. This would
have been done prior to our meeting tonight. They will bring out their
written explanations to their artifacts and bullets they want to be said
about each artifact. Finally, students will open their Voicethread app on
their devices and begin adding to their digital story.
Step 5 Digital Storytelling procedure that was sent home with families.
They were allowed to check out an iPad or tablet during the week.

● Have the student open up Voicethread on their device.

● Instruct them to click on “add” or (+) and then click “upload files”
which will then be sent straight to the Voicethread app.

● When students are finished, they will need to wait a minute for
the photos to upload on the app.Once photos are uploaded, they
will give their Voicethread a title and remember to save it.

● Use the to modification tool to sequence of photos on their

Voicethread. They can do this by holding down the photo and
dragging it to their desired destination.

● Next, the students use the comment button to add a recording to

their picture. They can do this by clicking the add button (+) and
sewing the options appear. The four options you can add are
text, phone numbers, audio recordings and video recordings.

● For our project, we will be selecting the audio recording option.

You will click the recording option with the microphone symbol.
There is also a camera option which allows you to record videos
of you to add to your Voicethread. They can start to speak after
a countdown from 3. Also there is a pencil tool that allows you to
draw and point out specific details of their artifact pictures, in
multiple colors. Finally you will save your work into the file
created.

● Students should add closing pages and wrap their

thoughts up within it.

● Once the students feel ready enough to make their second

artifact, they may continue to do so. They can follow along with
these steps in order to complete their second artifact on their
own.
Step 6 Editing and finalizing the digital story (6:30-6:40)
Once students are done looking over their Voicethreads, they will
watch their videos one last time, in case they feel they need to
touch up any last-minute details.

Step 7 Presenting and Sharing (6:40-7:00)

Once everyone is finished they will start at their table if 3-4 and begin
sharing their Voicethreads. After if any student wants to share their
Voicethread on the monitor, allow a few to come up and give a short
introduction about their digital story.

Step 8 Reflection (7:00-7:15)

At the end of the activity, all devices will be returned to the tables. I will
ask everyone if they feel like they learned something useful and take a
few responses from students raising hands. I will also ask if the
students feel they have a better understanding of using Voicethread
and making their own.Finally, I want to ask everyone if they enjoyed this
project, and if they’d ever recommended this app to a friend.

Step 9 Extension
I will collect feedback by getting ideas from a Pinterest. I will also
communicate through Google Classroom to see how families feel and
their children.