14 COLLABORATIVE DIGITAL STORYTELLING Beyond Words Vol.7, No. 1 (May 2019) Pedagogical Tasks for Collaborative Digital Storytelling Creation: Practical Design and Implementation Sandi Ferdiansyah sanjazzyn@yahoo.com English Education Department State Islamic University of Jember Jember, Indonesia Abstract This article is aimed at presenting a step by step into digital stories creation in a language classroom that teachers may adapt or adopt for their classroom purposes. At the outset, it will explore the nature of digital storytelling and empirical evidence of digital storytelling implementation across levels. Additionally, the article proposes ideas on how collaborative learning can be integrated in the making of digital storytelling. The design and implementation of pedagogical task emphasize on giving more opportunities for students to engage in the genre based collaborative digital stories project and foster their critical thinking and creativity. At the end of this article, alternative assessment is promoted to assess the learning process as well as the students’ project of digital storytelling. Providing students with scaffold activities, I contend that every language teacher now can empower their learners to become digital storytellers. Keywords: Collaborative digital storytelling, pedagogical tasks Introduction Digital storytelling (DST) is an innovation of storytelling practices in this 21st century learning. Frazel (2010) states that DST is a multimedia tale, “a modern expression of an ancient art (p.9).” DST, as a means of storytelling, includes elements such as gesture, movement, images (moving or still), sound, and writing (Bearne & Wolstencroft, 2007). Additionally, DST makes use of technology incorporation that enables storytelling to put those elements all together using digital tools, such as Windows Movie Maker, Photo Story 3 etc. Generally speaking, the use of DST has long been documented and discussed in primary, secondary, and tertiary levels of education. Although DST is not a new instructional method in language education, particularly in English language teaching (ELT), DST is considered more engaging and meaningful than either oral or written storytelling because it provides English learners with the opportunity to learn integrated English skills in a multimodal way. In primary education settings, Kervin and Mantei (2011) found out that DST enabled pre-primary school students to become multimodal story writers who can write and edit their stories into digital stories. Similarly, Hur and Suh (2012) revealed that DST was effective to facilitate the 3rd and 4th graders of English language learners to learn to write through revisions of text and improve their speaking skills. Meanwhile, the implementation of DST in secondary school settings also offers mailto:sanjazzyn@yahoo.com COLLABORSTIVE DIGITAL STORYTELLING 15 Beyond Words Vol.7, No. 1 (May 2019) powerful methodology that mediates students’ learning in language classroom. For examples, Chisholm and Trent (2013) discovered that DST could empower their 10th grader student’s critical thinking and creativity in multimodal composition project that combined linguistic and visual signs. Additionally, Niemi and Multisilta (2015, p.15) found out that DST was called effective to provide secondary school students with the development of the 21st century skills, such as “problem solving, argumentation, decision-making and cooperation.” Grounded in these empirical findings, it can be suggested that both pre- service and in-service teachers implement DST in language classroom to allow students to learn language within new literacy practices. The Collaboration In the 21st century learning, collaboration becomes one of the top skills for teachers to develop in the classroom and beyond. By employing collaborative learn- ing, teachers can facilitate students to develop their skill in working together with the other members of the group. Engaging students in collaborative learning will help them develop strategies on how to solve problems, respect others, and meet the work submission deadline. Giving students more opportunity to learn independently can lead to greater learner autonomy (Wei, Siriyothin, & Lian, 2018).Contextually speaking, Ferdiansyah (2017) states that collaboration on DST projects aims at engaging students in co-constructing story ideas and helping group members to develop their technological skills in more effective and efficient ways. Furthermore, Tobin (2012) suggests teachers to divide students into major divisions in the collaborative digital storytelling creation so that students can hold a specific job with equal responsibility. Adopting Tobin’s idea, teachers can divide students into group that consists of 4 to 5 students in each group and then decide the following jobs and their descriptions. An important point to remember is that teacher can still monitor students’ work toensure positive interactions among students (Mali, 2016).With minimal help of the teacher, students are expected to work more independently on the project. The intervention is given whenever students request assistance from the teacher for example to check the language, to edit the video etc. 16 COLLABORATIVE DIGITAL STORYTELLING Beyond Words Vol.7, No. 1 (May 2019) Pedagogical Tasks The design of pedagogical tasks in this article attempts to provide more opportunities for students to engage meaningfully in digital storytelling project. This follows the principle of task that is to mediate learners to express meaning rather than focus on language form (Nunan, 2004). The following pedagogical tasks are adapted from genre based approach in language teaching. Widodo (2016, p.3) highlights that genre based teaching focuses on “different types of scaffolding or support that enable learners to complete or work on a particular learning task.” The learning supports can be designed to provide students with knowledge development toward digital storytelling creation. Building Knowledge of the Field. In implementing collaborative digital storytell- ing project, teachers are suggested to start the activities by building students’ knowledge about digital storytelling. To do so, teachers can show the model of digital storytelling so that students can have same perception and understanding on what digital storytelling is. This is important to develop students’ story literacy as well as technology literacy. To do this, teachers can conduct two workshops, namely story writing workshop and working with digital tool workshop. In English as a foreign language, story writing workshop is important because it discusses the genre of personal or historical stories and lexico- grammar features. Meanwhile, working with digital tool workshop demonstrates the technical procedures how to work with digital tools to create digital story. Drafting and Developing Story. In this learning stage, teachers continue with determining the story themes. Later, students can begin to select their story theme together with their group. When they have agreed with the selected theme, they can pool the ideas to draft the story. While drafting the story, they can draw simple story plot which functions to guide them in writing the story. This story plot helps students significantly when they develop the story. There are three important elements students can consider when developing their story, how the story begins, flows, and ends. In addition to these three elements, they also need to be reminded to double check the lexico-grammar used in their writing. Visualizing Story and Storyboarding. From multimodal perspectives, the use of images in a story helps story writers visualize the story so that it makes the story more alive. In this stage, students work on a project of taking pictures that best represent their story ideas. For example, if they write a story about their school, they can take pictures of the school, classroom, school garden, and its surroundings. The number of photos taken should be adjusted with the story plot. When students have finished taking all the photos, teachers can provide a storyboard worksheet for students so that they can put photos and narration all together in it. The storyboard also serves as template where they can put the story in order and make it more sense. Creating Digital Story. What follow are stages how to put together the images, sound, and transitional effect using digital media. Students can use computer software or mobile phone application that students are familiar with. Students can use the storyboard to guide them how to arrange the order of the photos as well as the narration of the story. The story narration can be written or spoken. In other words, they can write the narration as caption in the photo or they can record the voiceover. This stage is challenging because they need to adjust the COLLABORSTIVE DIGITAL STORYTELLING 17 Beyond Words Vol.7, No. 1 (May 2019) image transition and its duration so that both of them can appear appropriately. Revising. Before publishing their digital storytelling, students are encouraged to have a final proofread of their digital story to find out errors on spelling, pronunciation, or grammar that may appear. Teachers can design a self-assessment rubric that they can use to reflect on appropriate language use. Additionally, they can also consult their English teachers to make sure if they have made their best with the linguistic elements. Apart from this technical revision, students need to be aware that their work has to be free from copyright issues, for examples credits of photos, story ideas, and song used in the story must be acknowledged. Publishing. Finally, students can publish their digital storytelling in this stage. To celebrate it, they can have a classroom conference through which they can share their digital storytelling to other groups. As follow up activities, they can also post it to social media platform so that they can reach wider audience. By sharing and publishing their digital storytelling worldwide, it is expected to foster the development of students’ confidence as digital storytellers and digital story-makers. Assessment. Anchored in alternative assessment approach, students should be given a greater opportunity to participate actively in assessment. Involving students in the process of assessment is a catalyst for a change of assessment practice (Cooper, 2015). This article proposes two scoring rubric models that can be used to assess students’ engagement and students’ digital stories (see appendix). First, teachers can design self-assessment template that assesses students’ level of understanding about digital storytelling and their own performance in the project. The use of self- assessment is also aimed at training students to do reflective practice. The area of self- assessment includes participation, under- standing, and collaboration. Meanwhile, teachers can design scoring rubric that assess students digital stories. Brenner (2014) suggests three areas namely academic skills, linguistic abilities, and technical creativity. Embarking on the template (see appendix), it is expected that students will understand the area they need to improve and teachers can construct more constructive assessment. Conclusion In conclusion, digital storytelling (DST) offers multimodal composition that enables students to learn language by integrating skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking as well as to develop multiple literacy skills, such as technology capacity, creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration. Engaging students in collaborative digital storytelling (DST) project allows them to share opinion and knowledge about DST. Additionally, dividing students into groups with different roles helps them share not only equal responsibility but also area of specialization. With genre based approach, students learn to create digital storytelling through scaffolding process that begins with building knowledge of DST, drafting and developing story, visualizing story, creating digital story, revising, and publishing DST.In implementing DST project, assessment can be made upon the criteria that allow students to reflect on their learning so that they can improve it. 18 COLLABORATIVE DIGITAL STORYTELLING Beyond Words Vol.7, No. 1 (May 2019) © Sandi Ferdiansyah Sandi Ferdiansyah is a faculty member at English Education Department of Institut Agama Islam Negeri (IAIN) Jember. His academic interests are ELT methodology, technology enhanced language learning, and teacher professional development. He can be contacted at sanjazzyn@yahoo.com Reference Bearne, E. &Wolstencroft, E. (2007). Visual approaches to teaching writing. London: Paul Chapman Publishing. Brenner, K. (2014). Digital stories: A 21st century communication tool for the English language classroom. English Teaching Forum, number 1, pp. 22 – 29. Chisholm, J., S., & Trent, B. (2013).Digital storytelling in a placed based composition course. Journal of adolescent and adult literacy, vol. 57(4), pp. 307-318. Cooper, S. (2015). A collaborative assessment of students’ placement learning. Assessment & evaluation in higher education, DOI: 10.1080/02602938.2015.1083093. Ferdiansyah, S. (2017, July). Digital storytelling. English Teaching Professional, 111, p. 52-56. Frazel, M. (2010).Digital storytelling guide foreducators.Washington, DC: International Society for Technology in Education(ISTE). Hur, J., W., &Suh, S. (2012).Making learning active with interactive whiteboards, podcasts, and digital storytelling in ELL classrooms.Computers in the schools, 29, pp. 320-338. Kervin, L., &Mantei, J. (2011). This is me: Children teaching us about themselves through digital storytelling. Practically primary, vol. 16(1), pp. 4-7. Mali, Y. C. G. (2016). Integrating technology in Indonesian EFL classrooms: Why not? Beyond Words, vol. 4(1), 17-26. Niemi, H., &Multisilta, J. (2015).Digital storytelling promoting twenty first century skills and students engagement.Technology, pedagogy, and education, vol. 25(4), p.451-468. Nunan, D. (2004). Task-based language teaching.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tobin, M., T. (2012). Digital storytelling: Reinventing literature circles. Voices from the middle, 20(2), p. 40 – 48. Wei, Q., Siriyothin, P., &Lian, A. P. (2018).Chinese University EFL Students’ Perceptions ofLearner Autonomy in Language Learning.Beyond Words, vol. 6(1), 26- 40. Widodo, H., P. (2016). Engaging young learners of English in a genre based digital storytelling project. Retrieved from: http://languageresearch.cambridge.org/ images/pdf/2015-16_ Widodo_CUP_TRP_final_report.pdf. mailto:sanjazzyn@yahoo.com http://languageresearch.cambridge.org/%20images/pdf/2015-16_%20Widodo_CUP_TRP_final_report.pdf http://languageresearch.cambridge.org/%20images/pdf/2015-16_%20Widodo_CUP_TRP_final_report.pdf http://languageresearch.cambridge.org/%20images/pdf/2015-16_%20Widodo_CUP_TRP_final_report.pdf COLLABORSTIVE DIGITAL STORYTELLING 19 Beyond Words Vol.7, No. 1 (May 2019) Table 2. Self-assessment Description: 60– 46 : I have done a great job 45– 31 : I have done a good job <30 : I need to do better work next time