EMAS Digital Storytelling

Milton Park Junior School in Portsmouth and Highwood Primary School in Woodley were involved in an exciting project linking ICT and speaking and listening skills in the primary classroom. The focus of this work was to develop literacy for all pupils but particularly those for whom English is an additional language (EAL). It also had wider benefits in terms of developing the intercultural dimension within the curriculum.
The project involved groups of pupils from Year 5 classes in both schools retelling traditional tales from a range of cultures and using ICT to create audio and visual recordings. This included animation, blue screen video/still technology, PowerPoint and audio editing.

Whilst each school continues to implement the Literacy and Numeracy strategies, this work formed a more integrated approach to combine skills from across the curriculum with a specific focus on literacy and ICT.

The 2-days? work in each school was filmed by crews of Year 5 children. The sessions began
with a dual-language story retelling. The pupils were able to combine the skills and knowledge, which they had developed in recent literacy tasks, to form the basis for their initial ideas. In groups, the children discussed a variety of stories and eventually chose one to retell. The expertise and cultural backgrounds of some EAL pupils helped inform the final choice. The pupils set about storyboarding and developing ideas on how to present their work. Most stories were recorded and edited in both English and a variety of first languages such as Urdu, Nepali, Zulu and Setswana. Stop animations, using plasticine and Lego, provided some of the visual elements of their stories which were filmed using digital blue cameras. The children also used blue-screen chroma-keying video techniques. In addition, many groups searched the internet for copyright-free images and audio samples which they could download to enhance their stories.

ICT supports speaking and listening in a variety of ways. Many pupils, including EAL pupils, use non-standard English when they are talking. A recorded sample of speech can be replayed so that the speaker appreciates how the audience hears it. In this way pupils can critically evaluate their efforts and make changes as appropriate. Being able to edit and improve work is motivating and builds self-confidence. The opportunity to record and edit audio files in private eliminates the concerns some pupils have over public speaking, especially pupils with EAL.

In small groups, speaking and listening allows effective modelling of the correct use of language whilst acting as a springboard into the writing process so children are able to synthesise their thoughts before beginning writing.

Sometimes children?s writing mirrors their spoken word and the online spelling and grammar check facilities can help them to overcome the immediate worry of sentence construction and use of non-standard English. Moreover, word-processors can help overcome the blank piece of paper syndrome that inhibits some children from starting their writing.

Bilingual assistants were used to conduct a dual language retelling of a traditional story. This helped to model the process that children could follow in their groups. Although not an essential resource, bilingual assistants were able to help pupils rehearse and improve their first language oral retelling. Parents of EAL children are a rich resource and were encouraged to support their child throughout the project.

Outcomes for EAL pupils were deemed to be particularly high. These pupils were able to utilise stories from their own culture and where appropriate were able to retell in first language. This was greeted very positively by other pupils - for example the rest of the class clapped when a pupil used first language. One class teacher also reported that the benefits for one of the early stage bilingual learners, who never previously talked in class, was now talking confidently all the time and answering questions in open-class forums.

Two student teachers, each allocated to work with a group of pupils, were able to meet some of their QTS related to working with bilingual pupils. The class teachers have both benefited in terms of being more able to articulate how collaborative group work and ICT benefits pupils and in particular EAL pupils. All staff involved reported benefits in terms of improvements in ICT competency.

Two training videos for teachers have now been produced. ICT conferences for practitioners have been arranged for the next academic year where the principles and techniques used during this project will be demonstrated. These will exemplify how ICT can be embedded across the curriculum and used particularly to support those pupils learning English as an additional language (EAL).

The finished stories can be seen on the South-East Grid for Learning (SEGfL) website at
www.segfl.org.uk/microsites/emas ...

Since the initial project was completed, the two schools have developed a collaborative partnership working on a joint storytelling venture.


Lisa Howard ? Year 5 Class Teacher at Milton Park Junior School, Portsmouth.
Bill Boyer ? Year 5 Class Teacher at Highwood Primary School, Woodley.
Chris Pim ?Ethnic Minority Achievement Service (EMAS), Portsmouth.

EMAS digital storytelling Wokingham

Links

• Click here to view the online presentation...

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