Raising Readers and Writers

We finished our Digital multimodal class on Friday with show and tell. Everyone shared their multimodal digital projects which were a digital response to a poem or song and a personal memoir piece. As what always happens when students are given choice, we had a wide variety of projects. The final projects ranged from humorous, to serious, to sentimental, to political statements. Everyone’s individuality was able to emerge, even though we all had the same assignment. That is one of the reasons I think student choice is so important when we are asking students to complete an assignment. We all learned how to use Photo Story and Audacity, to import pictures, scan images, create transitions, add music and voice overs just to name a few things. Probably more important, was the conversation that we had each morning before we began to work. Creating a metadiscourse, explaining the choices we made and why we made them was very important to the process. This project showed us that we were, in fact, creating another text to show our understanding of the original text. The social context was critical to the success of the project. Not only did we have conversations at the beginning of class about the process, but also conversation abounded during our work time. It was not uncommon to see participants at each other’s work stations trying to help. The tech support was very important too. John, our tech support person, was very patient with all of us and Dr. Newell was there to answer questions as well. I so appreciated Dr. Newell’s approach to this class. It was a true writing workshop atmosphere where we learned together and supported each other along the way.

So here are my projects. First, “I’m Learning to Speak English” by J. Patrick Lewis spoke to me because of my own student population. J. Patrick Lewis is coming to visit at the Young Author’s Writing Camp this week, so I thought I’d look for one of his poems. I was so pleased when I found it here. I chose photos of my kids that I took throughout the year and chose a song with Latino influence.

My second piece, “Summer Gifts” is about a week I spent with my grandma 6 years ago, about 3 months before she died. My grandma was something else! There were many times my grandfather would yell, “Turn that damn radio down” as she cleaned to Meatloaf or Prince blaring from her stereo. All 10 of her grandchildren thought they were her favorite because she made each of us feel that way. I chose “Heaven Can Wait” by Meatloaf as one of the background music pieces. She loved Meatloaf (my cousin took her to their concerts at Blossom Music Center until she was well into her 80s). I decided to show photos of her with only the music playing in the background at the end of my narration because I wanted my audience to focus on her and see the influence she had on my life.

I am already thinking of ways to use this on my classroom next year. I hope you enjoy!!

I’m Learning to Speak English by J. Patrick Lewis

Summer Gifts