Reflection #7

Reflection #7
I have had very little experience in creating photo stories utilizing the current technology In universities. I was unaware of the ease of use of some of these programs and the useful and creative way of conveying a point or a story as it is in this case. A digital story, I find to be very similar to PowerPoint and IMovie in the Macintosh operating system. The way I created mine is how I approach almost every project and that is to relate it to me and to my personal past experiences. I use association to make It Interesting to me and easy to remember and I do an outline in this case to convey my message clearly. The message and goal has to be thought out right away for everything else to flow. My message was to convey to the audience that Technology in the classroom is essential and without it we are not competitive with the rest of the world. Technology in the classroom is missing in a lot of instances around the country and that is very unfortunate. Children at an early age are very receptive and absorbe things like a sponge, waiting until middle school or high school to implement technology in the classroom is ineffective. Think of how difficult it is for grown ups now to adapt to the computer age. The same can happen to kids if they are made to wait too long when computers are not accessible. After having my message clearly defined, I went looking for my Images that would be compelling, attention grabbing and interesting. My goal was to have the audience stay focused, interested and possibly amused and enlightened. I chose to write notes on the side of my photo story to help me remember some of the key points. My images were very specific so I did not need the notes mentioned. I made sure that my images were of highest quality so they would not pixelize. I cropped them accordingly and began downloading images into my project in the order that I needed to see them. I moved images around if new ideas popped into my head and if I wanted to rework the storyline. I have a Mac at home but needed to work on it in a PC, so I brought along a cd of some music that I wanted to add to my story and worked on it in school. I wrote word per word what I wanted to say and made sure that I wanted the right transition and pacing of the changing of the slides/images. I chose different transitions so as to keep the audience on their toes. If the story is about technology, it is important to make sure that the finished product backs up your message. I added music to the background, after recording my voice and previewed the movie to make sure it’s what I wanted. It was my first project in Photo story 3, and I am pleased to say that the project came out very well.
The message being that technology in the classroom is essential to stay competitive, up to date, and current. This message was made very clear using compelling, interesting Images In a creative way plus using a soundtrack and a voicetrack over the entire project. As stated earlier, the notes on the side are an added benefit but are not mandatory, but recommended just the same. I highly recommend Photo story to anyone who wants to convey a message creatively and with ease of usage.