Journal Entry 5: ISTE Article 4

Storytelling in the Web 2.0 Era

By: Glen Bull

This article begins with some general information about Web 2.0 and how technology is changing everything in our society. From work, to study, to play, all of our lives are effected by technology in big and small ways. The web is so pervasive that most applications and software can now be run via the web for little to no cost which in turn has given access to anyone who can access a computer that has internet capabilities. Cities like San Francisco have even installed free WiFi in some areas and nearly all cities provide free WiFi in designated public spaces like libraries or college campuses.

The article continues on to discuss how web technologies can be used free and easily to assign students storytelling projects for a number of different purposes. The sites are all free and provide a number of different formats for storytelling:mapping, time-lining, comic stripping, and presenting with audio/video.

How could this be used in a high school English class?

I immediately thought of William Faulkner's The Sound and The Fury or J.R.R. Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring trilogy for the mapping or the time-lining exercises. These books, as are a myriad of other fiction works, are strongly tied to where and when the events take place and the success of understanding the texts depends on the readers understanding of those circumstances in time and space. I think it would be great to have students complete assignments that increase their understanding of the subject matter.

Do you think it is appropriate to use site's like Myspace or Flickr in class assignments?

I think that it is important that educators carefully consider the material they present to their students. I think that sites like Myspace should only be used in courses that are post high school. I don't think that the students are too immature or that it is inappropriate; I just think that when working with adolescents we need to maintain an appropriate amount of control and that would not be possible when using such public and unpredictable sites.