HOPEWORKS 'N CAMDEN: Expanding the Futures of Youth

Digital StoryTelling is a project-based learning program that integrates technology with language arts. A digital story is a short video, consisting of a series of still images and effects that are combined with a narrated soundtrack to tell a story. A digital story project provides youth with an opportunity to share a meaningful experience.

The digital storytelling process is broken into two parts, the writing phase and the video phase. During the writing phase trainees at Hopeworks will brainstorm and research story ideas, draft and revise scripts, and design story boards. The writing process will allow trainees the opportunity to further develop their narrative skills. In addition trainees will have to edit their stories for content, continuity and time. The project also requires that youth develop their oral presentation skills because they provide the narration for their own digital story. Once the script and accompanying story board are complete they become the blueprint for the video. The trainees will gather the visual elements and add other audio and visual effects and then use digital video editing software to construct the final video.

Our program has been adapted from the original curriculum established by the Center for Digital Storytelling at U.C. Berkeley in 1993.