Using Puentedura’s (2011) SAMR (Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, Redefinition) framework as a guide, let me take you on a four-part journey through my adventures in digital storytelling over the last fifteen years.

In 2012, I commenced work with a group of Year 1 students in an academic extension program on Saturday afternoons. Together, we examined the oral tradition and how narratives (factual or fictional) change over time through retelling, and then in a second session we looked at how a retelling as a digital text might change its meaning. We then made a storyboard and used claymation and flat-lay photographs to sequence an original narrative, employed Windows MovieMaker to animate and add a soundtrack, and then published it on YouTube. I repeated this sequence a number of times over an eight-year period; you can see some of the results here.

Though requiring heavy scaffolding in terms of both technical and storytelling skills, this represented a significant ‘step up’ for me as a teacher, both in my capacity to teach and my expectations of the student cohort. It felt really good to have ‘crossed the divide’ from enhancement to transformation! My students and I had moved into the modification stage of the SAMR process, resulting in a different (multimedia-based, sharable, feedback-enabled) end product via better framing of enhanced learning outcomes (Department of Education, 2018).

References

Department of Education (2018). SAMR Explained. ARC Learning. https://arc.educationapps.vic.gov.au/f8fd324d-a297-4752-9487-88c59003ef48/SAMR%20Curriculum%20Examples.pdf.rsf

Puentedura, R. (2011). A brief introduction to TPCK and SAMR. Hippasus.  http://www.hippasus.com/rrpweblog/archives/2011/12/08/BriefIntroTPCKSAMR.pdf