Before we delve into an exploration of digital storytelling as a pedagogical approach, it’s important that we consider the concept of a ‘story.’ What exactly do we mean when we say a ‘story’? What is it that makes a story an effective pedagogical tool for teaching and learning? Since time immemorial stories have been used to convey meaning to humans, as they were often used as a means of passing down culture and tradition from generation to generation. Stories thus, provide us with powerful narratives that can help us to know our past, understand our present and envision our future.

Vitali (2016, p. 30) refers to stories as “aural, oral, literary human expressions.” Rightfully so Vitali (2016) further goes on to state that stories represent “human extensions and human technologies designed to explain who we are, how we come to know, how we negotiate meaning, and how we communicate” (p. 30). Others such as McNett (2016) further suggest that stories are a fundamental representation of the way we view our own experiences. Indeed, this is what makes stories such a powerful pedagogical tool, i.e. the ability of stories to significantly affect people on spiritual, mental, and emotional levels. When combined with today’s technological advancements, storytelling offers vastly untapped potential for uses in a variety of fields, including education.

The notion of digital stories emerged in tandem with the dawn of the modern technological era. Though originally seen as a tool for the technologically elite, digital storytelling pioneers such as Lambert and Atchley through the Center for Digital Storytelling, successfully advocated for ‘ordinary people’ to learn how to create and use digital stories (Erdem, 2018; Hardy and Sumner, 2018). The Center for Digital Storytelling (now called Story Center) defines a digital story as “a short, first-person video-narrative created by combining recorded voice, still and moving images, and music or other sounds.” While the term ‘digital storytelling’ may sound relatively new, the concept has been discussed in academia since the early 1980s (Lambert, 2009).

Anderson and Chua (2018) note that the digital storytelling movement began in the late 1980s as a means of promoting media production that was accessible to all persons interested in creative personal expression. Most recently, however, the concept as piqued further interest given the advancements and developments in information and digital communications such as personal computers and smartphones. These developments have provided us with the opportunity to easily create and disseminate our stories in a wide variety of formats, and across multiple platforms. What exactly is digital storytelling though?  Is it simply telling a story using a computer or is there more to it?

A review of the existing literature has revealed several definitions. Robin (2016) views it as a combination of “the art of telling stories with a mixture of digital media, including text, pictures, recorded audio narration, music, and video” (p. 18). He further states that “these multimedia elements are blended together using computer software, to tell a story that usually revolves around a specific theme or topic and often contains a particular point of view” (p. 18). Others such as Frazel (2011) offer a much simpler definition, i.e. “digital storytelling is a process that blends media to enrich and enhance the written or spoken word” (p. 9). What is clear from these definitions is that these stories make use of a variety of media to improve the written word (text). Another definition, posited by Porter (2005), views digital storytelling as “an emerging art form of personal, heartful expression that enables individuals and communities to reclaim their personal cultures while exploring their artistic creativity” (para. 1).

From these definitions we can see that digital storytelling can be used in a variety of settings, utilizing a variety of media sources. What exactly, does this mean for us as educators, instructional designers, and course developers if we decide to use digital stories in our lessons and courses? What exactly are the characteristics that make the approach effective? In the next lesson, we’ll look at what is called the 7 Elements of Digital Storytelling.

Let’s Recap

References

Anderson, K. T., & Chua, P. H., (2018). Digital Storytelling as an Interactive Digital Media Context. Retrieved March 23, 2020, from Pressbooks.com website: https://idnarrative.pressbooks.com/chapter/digital-storytelling-as-an-interactive-digital-media-context

Hardy, P., & Sumner, T. (Eds.). (2018). Cultivating compassion: How digital storytelling is transforming healthcare. Springer.

Erdem, M. N. (Ed.). (2018). Handbook of Research on Transmedia Storytelling and Narrative Strategies. IGI Global.

Frazel, M. (2011) Digital Storytelling: Guide for Educators. International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE), Wahington DC.

Lambert, J. (2009) Where it all started: The center for digital storytelling in California. Story circle: Digital storytelling around the world, 2009, pp. 79–90

McNett, G. (2016) Using Stories to Facilitate Learning, College Teaching, 64:4, 184-193, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/87567555.2016.1189389

Porter, B. (2005). DigiTales. Retrieved March 09, 2016, from http://www.digitales.us

Robin, B. (2016). The Power of Digital Storytelling to Support Teaching and Learning. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1125504.pdf

Vitali, F. (2016). Teaching with stories as the content and context for learning. Global Education Review, 3(1). 27-44 Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1090163.pdf