Digital storytelling is the practice of using computer-based tools and digital/multimedia material to tell stories. The idea of storytelling revolves around the idea of combining the art of telling stories with using graphics, audio, video, and Web publishing.
Digital stories can vary in length, but most of the stories used in education typically last between 2 and 10 minutes. The topics used in digital storytelling range from personal tales to the recounting of historical events.
Digital storytelling and its educational use
There are many ways Digital Storytelling could be used in education. One of the first decisions to be made when deciding to use this tool in the curriculum is whether an instructor will create the Digital Stories or have their students do it. Teacher-created digital stories may also be used to enhance current lessons within a larger unit, as a way to facilitate discussion about the topics presented in a story and as a way of making abstract or conceptual content more understandable.
Digital Storytelling can also be a potent tool for language students who are taught to create their own stories. After viewing example digital stories students may be given assignments to create their own stories. The process can capitalize on the creative talents of students as they learn to use the language, and how to use different digital technologies to narrate a story in a different language.
Popular online services to create digital stories
Here are a list of most-popular sites to create digital stories:
✻ Storehouse
Storehouse is an online digital storytelling medium, targeted towards iPad users, that allows them to create collages, albums, and stories using their own pictures. Once a user creates a page of photos, that page remains private until the user decides how they want to share it and who they want to share it with. For example, users can send a link to their page via SMS, iMessage, or Email, or they can embed their page on their personal blog and share it through Facebook and Twitter.
Storehouse app also allows users to upload images from their phone. Images may be edited and text can be added either onto the image itself or as a caption.
✻ Medium
Medium is a story and idea-sharing platform that allows users to write blog-style posts that range from self-help to current events topics. Users also include a title image, and many even incorporate images throughout the body of their post.
✻ Compoz
Compoz is a new online digital storytelling medium that allows users to compose short visual stories using their own pictures. Users can take pictures of a vacation or outing, then place the photos in any order they wish, add picture captions and a story title, and share their story with others.
The service is targeted towards iPhone users.
✻ Maptia
Maptia is similar to Medium, but with greater focus on the images. The website is a digital storytelling service whose primary aim is to “foster empathy and understanding for other cultures, other places, and other ways of life.” Users post articles much like those found in publications like the New York Times, but the distinguishing feature of these articles is their incorporation of high-resolution images to enhance their storytelling. Although Maptia articles are stylistically similar to those of major news publications, they tend to focus on content that is less well known than that found in the mainstream media.
✻ Atavist
Atavist is a paid service for transmedia and visual storytelling. After signing up, users have access to certain tools to create a interactive reading experience.
The Atavist Magazine publishes thorough investigative journalism pieces that incorporate images to enhance their storytelling. Most pieces are divided into one to two parts, with three or four sections in each part, and an image marking the transition between sections. In order to keep their readers oriented, many authors also include an index of the characters discussed in their piece.