Topic: In search of greener pastures- My Immigration story
Platform or tool for the creation of the digital storytelling project: Canva/Book Creator
Rationale:-
Each immigrant has their own story to tell.
Settling into a new country is not easy. Immigrants must adapt to an unfamiliar environment and lifestyle, while maintaining their cultural identity, language, and background. I moved to this beautiful and multicultural country which is famous for its natural wonders, beaches, and the outback as a Permanent Resident in March’2008 at the age of 25 years.
My digital story will feature a timeline of my journey, many challenges, and opportunities that came across my path, new work culture, climate, accent (not to mention funny Australian slangs) and overall living style of the people living in this busy and developed urban environment.
I will be using Canva as a graphic design platform to create multimedia content that can be easily shared through social media. Canva is a user-friendly tool that is packed with wide array of features and elements. It has copyright free high-quality graphics, photos, and animations and music. This free designing tool has thousands of templates, animated gifs, and infographics. As students under the age of 13 are protected by the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, so they need a consent form to create Canva for Education account. Canva also lets you print in different formats. Book creator will be used to create and publish/share the book.
This story writing and storytelling activity can be integrated into KLAs like English, Computer, Art, and Values. It will meet the diverse learning needs of students and will allow them to make their thinking visible using amazing storyboard templates and video collage. Digital storytelling will allow to make personal connection and an opportunity to reflect, think critically and apply problem solving skills whilst helping students become a better writer as they create their digital story using their imagination and creativity.
I love this! I use Canva a lot for static, single images to promote displays, etc. but I’ve not considered using it to create a book. I’m keen to see the final result.
This sounds like it will be a really interesting piece of digital literature. I think telling a part of your own life story will be very engaging. Morra (2013) believes that a great story can help us communicate and empathise with each other. I think your story will offer a great insight into immigrant perspectives of Australia and is something that is very different from own experience. I look forward to reading it.
I would love to know if you are targeting a certain age group or audience (e.g., secondary students, adults, recent immigrants etc.)? As you are creating a timeline of your journey will your story be linear or can the reader jump around the timeline and read your piece out of order? I think this would be interesting if each section on the timeline was a snapshot and the reader could jump around to read the parts that interested them the most.
References
Morra, S.(2013, May 30). Eight steps to great storytelling. Edtechteacher. https://edtechteacher.org/8-steps-to-great-digital-storytelling-from-samantha-on-edudemic/
Hi Puneet,
I loved your idea, as a migrant myself I always enjoy the benefit of living in the multicultural environment of Australia also. One of the aspects I most enjoy is sharing stories with people of diverse backgrounds.
Have you looked into any of the resources at the Immigration Museum in Melbourne? They have been putting together some wonderful digital materials of late which increase accessibility to our stories of diversity, which may be of help. You can find the link here:
https://museumsvictoria.com.au/immigrationmuseum/at-home/
I have also done a bit of writing around the subject of Global Citizenship Education and believe your work will be such a great example of cosmopolitanism in Australia. Well done!
I love hearing migration stories, how people find themselves in Australia and what they make of life here. Your proposal reminded me of some of the work being done by Storycenter. I think digital storytelling is a powerful tool for telling stories about migration. For students, it not only provides the opportunity to create their own stories but also read stories that are like their own or learn from stories that broaden their world view (McNair & Edwards, 2021). I’d love to hear more about the context that you’ll be using the story in. I’ve only ever used Canva to create posters, so I’ll be looking forward to seeing how you use the platform to tell your story.
McNair, J. C., & Edwards, P. A. (2021). The Lasting Legacy of Rudine Sims Bishop: Mirrors, Windows, Sliding Glass Doors, and More. Literacy Research: Theory, Method, and Practice, 70(1), 202–212. https://doi.org/10.1177/23813377211028256
Hi Puneet, Here’s a link to the Storycenter project just in case the above hyperlink doesn’t work:
https://www.storycenter.org/stories-of-home-cover