Digital Storytelling Rubric

My assignment for class this week was to create an analytic rubric for the First Thanksgiving digital storytelling project I have been creating over the past few weeks. If you need a reminder of just what that project entails, click here to visit the project wiki. While I have seen countless rubrics and heard a great deal about the benefits of utilizing these tools, I must be honest in saying that I have never actually used a rubric to assess student work. This is more than likely a result of the lack of student projects I have incorporated into my class so far this year. It seems like all we do is teach the curriculum “with fidelity” and give the appropriate assessments. These assessments provide responses from which students much simply choose the correct answer, a form of traditional assessment. Rubrics, on the other hand, serve as a form of authentic assessment in which students demonstrate their knowledge through the creation of a project. In authentic assessment, students must take what they have learned and actually apply it, not just regurgitate it.

One thing I really love about rubrics (and a major selling point for me) is the idea of providing students with the rubrics prior to the creation of the project. This is a great way for students to have a tangible outline of my expectations to refer back to throughout the creation process. Hopefully this would not only serve as a constant reminder of what they should be focusing on and keep them on track with their projects, but will eliminate any surprise from the final grade. Finally, while creating my rubric I could not help but reflect on prior grading experiences and all the times I have heard fellow teachers discuss the possible retention of below-level students while comparing their work to that of other students as a means of justification. These students may be meeting grade level requirements, but because their work is not at the same level as others’, they are being recommended for retention. I disagree with this method of student evaluation, and this could be prevented by utilizing a rubric on student work and using that rubric as the means of evaluation.

To create my rubric, I used RubiStar. I have seen the website before, but this was my first time actually creating a rubric with it. RubiStar is easy to use and has numerous pre-created rubrics for viewing and editing. The first thing I did on the site was research the different types of rubrics and the different criteria within each one. I decided to use a storytelling rubric as the basis of mine and then combine different aspects from the digital project rubric (such as appearance and time management). One thing I really liked about this site, also, is that you are able to choose which criteria to include within a rubric and are then able to edit the information within each box of the chosen criteria. You can keep the rubric as standard as it comes or as specific and customized as you like. I enjoyed this activity and definitely foresee many RubiStar rubrics in my future!

Click here to view my rubric on the RubiStar website.

First Thanksgiving Sample Project

This week for my assignment, I had to create a sample project to post on my curriculum page for students to view. My curriculum page, which was created last week on the topic of the First Thanksgiving, will soon be complete not only with the task and pre-evaluated resources, but a sample project and rubric for assessment of student knowledge. Through creating this sample project, I have not only been able to put my expectations in a tangible format, but I have also been able to determine any possible difficulties students might have when creating their First Thanksgiving project. You can view my sample project below.



Now, when I originally planned this project for my 2nd grade students, I imagined that they would create a Thanksgiving story from the point of view of Native Americans or Pilgrims, but as I created the sample project I noticed myself going in a slightly different direction. I found it worked better to research my chosen side (Pilgrims in this case) and present the facts in the different topic areas in more of an outline format. I also think this would be easier for my 2nd graders as this would be the first time they have used Prezi to create a digital story. I was thinking that once students have created their story in this format, they can then take it a step further and turn it into more of a narrative if they would like. This will help my struggling students by providing a bit more structure while still giving the option of a challenge to my more advanced students.

My only concern is that my 2nd graders will view the sample project and use my information as their own, as they sometimes struggle with putting things in their own words. Maybe if I use less detail in the example it would allow for more creative range when they are making their own projects. However, if I use fewer details they will inevitably model their own projects after the example and use minimal details, as well. If anyone has any suggestions on ways to moderate student work while still providing a quality example, please share!!

First Thanksgiving Curriculum Page

Click here to view my curriculum page!

I have heard quite a bit about curriculum pages in my other classes, but I have never created one of my own so I was excited when I learned we would be creating a curriculum page for class this week. The tool used for the curriculum page was a wiki, and the wiki will be developed over the next few weeks. Luckily, last semester I took a course in which I completed an extensive group research paper using a wiki. That was my first experience with a wiki, and I learned a lot about how to navigate it. I decided to use Wikispaces for my curriculum page, as that was the wiki site I used in my last experience.

Last week, I brainstormed an idea for a digital storytelling project and planned each area of the project for my second grade students. I decided to run with that idea, as I had already “storyboarded” it out. “Why reinvent the wheel?” as is the common theme in education. Therefore, my curriculum page was designed around the idea of my second graders creating their own digital stories about the First Thanksgiving. Students have to choose a side to take: Native Americans or Pilgrims. Stories must be told from the chosen point of view. Not only do I think these stories would be fun for students to create, but they would be fun to grade as well! While we do not have to have the rubric created for our curriculum page quite yet, I am thinking of creating a teacher and student rubric so the students have a part in evaluating, also. Students could evaluate each others’ projects with a peer-evaluation rubric. That would be a great way to get students looking for important qualities of digital projects and keep them involved in every presentation.

Before I began creating the actual curriculum page, I took some time to research some quality kid-friendly web resources on the First Thanksgiving. I wanted to make sure the provided sites included images and videos, as well as text, so this was not as easy a task as this might sound. Once I found a few sites I liked, I wrote a brief description for each site in Microsoft Word and saved it. (I am a saving-addict ever since the time my computer randomly restarted and I lost a project I had been working on for three hours.) Once I had my sites, I began building the rest of the curriculum page in Microsoft Word, too. I am extremely familiar with Microsoft Word and its formatting, so I did most of the planning and creating there. When I had all the material for the project planned out, it was time to put it in the wiki.

While I have experience using a wiki, boy did I struggle with the formatting aspect of Wikispaces. I copied the entire Word document and pasted it into Wikispaces. However, when I wanted to center and bold the headings, it would not simply do what I was commanding it to do. Instead of just bolding the two-word heading, it would bold the heading and the following two lines of regular text. Then, when I tried to correct it the actual heading would not center or stay bold, but the regular body text would not become unbold! This was extremely frustrating, and I think I spent an hour just trying to center and bold specific text. This was the most frustrating part of process for me. However, I soon found a solution! If I formatted everything, and I mean everything from line spacing to text bolding, in Microsoft Word, I could paste it into the Wiki and it would keep its formatting. This was very helpful to learn because in the beginning, I was pasting the information from Word with basic formatting, but I was then attempting to format more in the actual Wikispaces domain. I did not enjoy formatting in Wikispaces at all, and I would not recommend it.

I would recommend using a wiki for curriculum pages, though, as it is able to be modified and added to easily. I am looking forward to adding the final pieces to the project, such as a rubric and sample project. As I continue to create my curriculum page and add to my wiki, it is important that I keep in mind my audience, second graders, and I don’t make the project too complicated. I could definitely see how it would be easy to overwhelm students with too much going on within a curriculum web page. While I do not have a bunch of flashy stuff on my curriculum page for my second graders, I must admit that I was quite proud of myself when I got the picture on the page as it really seems to bring the page to life J.