Each year OSU faculty and Alum accompany hundreds of student intern / ambassadors on international travel expeditions to engage in community service learning opportunities. Last year Professors Carmel Finley & David Bernell and I helped ‘returnees’ learn and fairly well master digital storytelling techniques. By the end of a ten-week 2 credit course 9 students created and published and impressive interactive publication of their learning experiences. Once again, this summer a group of Beavers Without Borders (BWOB) students will travel for a week-long community service project in the Dominican Republic.
This spring, during weeks 9 & 10 we will conduct a two hour pre-trip in-class workshop to plan, storyboard and train students to effectively photograph & video, conduct oral-history interviews, and write and keep daily accounts of their activities while in nation.
In the fall, those students, teachers and advisors will collaborate to plan, design, construct and publish an iBook on their BWOB Dominican Republic Service Trip.
This class will take advantage of the opportunities offered by a hybrid designation and format. Students will learn and practice all facets of digital publication including, research, planning, design, composition, publication and marketing. Early in the quarter (and in the final weeks) students will come together in class to pool their curated media, talents, skills and media specialties. They will engage in materials reviews and design and content discussions, plus engage in routinely scheduled peer review and assessment. During weeks 3-5 & 7-9 students will learn and practice entirely outside of class times and locations. They will use the Canvas LMS, a self-teaching manual for the Ibooks Author software application and a series of supplemental assignments and course materials. Where the learning curve is steep embedded audio and video mini-lectures will assist students as they move through their course work. Regularly scheduled F2F and on-line ‘office hours’ will provide support and feedback where needed.
Learning objectives include:
To explore, examine, reflect & discuss the culture, history and present day status of the Dominican Republic.
To learn and practice the tools of digital storytelling and publishing.
To practice effective techniques in research & writing for digital media.
To examine, practice and defend ethical choices for media usage while respecting copyright, shareware and Creative Commons standards as they relate to digital publishing.
To engage in critical assessment of design and layout, plus content and interactive elements selections.
To conduct and practice effective analysis of primary and secondary documents.
And, to collaborate generously to share media, tools, skills and expertise with students,
co-workers and off-campus (sponsor) agencies.
This will be our first attempt at ‘flipping’ course content, assignments and learning objectives onto a distance ed platform. We have created a series of stand alone instruction and practice modules that should ensure student learning, sharing and achievement in both face-to-face and on-line learning environments.
If you are interested in seeing the result of last year’s class effort the Beavers Without Borders Dominican Republic Trip 2014 iBook can be downloaded from the iTunes Store.
