In this open ds106 experience we have travelled through a variety of media forms and ways to tell parts of a story in visual, design, audio, video, and remix form. In making, say an animated GIF, you may not be creating a full, Vonnegut shaped arc, but you likely have focused on a part of a plot, or shown the key character of a persona.

For a final project, we ask you yo construct a narrative across these media forms, using products that are done in response to any of the hundreds of activities in the ds106 Assignment Bank. This is more than just putting a few GIFs, posters, and animations in a post; you need to create a narrative that connects and runs through them.

And it all should start with or revolve around a character- a central figure that can be real, imagined, from the past, from the future.

See the full specifications for the project, and go run with it (Run, Forest, Run!).

You won’t get graded for this, you wont get a badge o a certificate, you are creating solely for your own satisfaction and creative action.

We ask registered ds106 students to contribute two new assignment ideas (and complete for each an example), two detailed assignment tutorials (create a post for an assignment you did that explains how you did it, use the tags from the assignment to mark it as a turorial), and have contributed two Daily Creates.

If you have not done these already, this falls into the Pay It Forward category, as the ones you got to use during ds106 came from someone else in ds106.

Include your contributions in a final unit summary.

You are all soon to be ds106 graduates. We ask that as you pass through the wrought iron gates, that you create an advice piece for future students of this class.

It should be in the form of some kind of media (audio, video, set of animated gifs, etc.)– should a written essay. In this piece, consider what you would tell students of ds106 in the future about this class. What did you get out of it? What should they expect? How should they approach the work? What will they love/hate about the class? What will surprise them most about the class? What will they get out of the experience?

When you do this, make it conversational as if you are really talking to a future student. For reference, see the pay it forwards created by previous students.

Make it memorable!

Include this media as an embed in your final summary blog post.

Way back in boot camp we suggested that you set up categories on your blog, if you have not been using them, now is the time. Get out your brooms! This will help you be sure your site is clean and organized as ds106 finishes. Or maybe after all this time, you have a better idea how to make all the work you did easy to find.

If you have not done so already, create and assign your posts to appropriate categories. For more about creating and using categories in WordPress, see the ds106 Handbook: http://ds106.us/handbook/blogging/organizing-with-categories/

If you do not already have a Best Work category, create it now.  Add your blog posts to this category that represent what you consider your best work done in this class, choosing at least five items representing your best stuff. We would like to see at least one from Visual/Design, one from Audio, one from Web, one from Video, one from Remix, but the choice is up to you.

In your final weekly blog post, include your choices, and explain why they are on your “Best of ds106” shelf.

Some things you might want to use to wrap up your ds106 experience:

• Link back to and review your Unit 3 post about your definition of Digital Storytelling – How has (nor not) your concept of storytelling evolved having (almost) finished this class? How might you recast your idea of what storytelling is?
• Reflec on your final story project and link to/summarize a “making of” media assignment posts (one post per each assignment created for the final project). More than sharing us how hard (or easy) it was to make, tell us about what the story means to you, or what you hope others see in it, or what you might have wanted to do differently.
• Summarize how you contributed to the ds106 community- not links or counts, but a qualitative summary of how well you participated in twitter, blog comments, the ds106 show, the group projects, ds106 radio, etc.
• Summarize and provide links to your tutorial/assignment/daily create contributions.
• Include a link to your best work category and include some commentary on why you made those selections.
• Embed and describe your Pay it Forward to Future students message.
• Add any final thoughts, reflections, complaints, ideas about your experience in ds106! And remember, you never leave ds106! Keep blogging, keep tweeting.