What is a story? In the simplest terms, a story is a report of real or fictitious events. Seems simple enough right? Hardly. Have you ever listened to two different people recount the same event, yet there is a stark contract between these two stories? One person can break away on tangents trying to relay … Continue reading Final Portfolio: How and why is it important for you to tell stories?

Here is a link to my story: https://www.dropbox.com/s/nlivu0nmwsjnqzm/1080p-1.mov?dl=0

TDC1774

I came across this StoryCorps story and was struck by the humility and humanity of the narrator. It’s amazing what a little kindness and a hot meal can bring about. I’ve recently seen an increase in stories about people from opposite sides coming together to break bread, and I feel this particular story really catches … Continue reading Digital Story Critique

This week’s reading was another from Joe Lambert, and was a more structured view of storytelling than from the previous reading of his. He breaks down his story telling process into 7 distinct parts: Owning Your Insights Owning Your Emotions Finding the Moment Seeing Your Story Hearing Your Story Assembling Your Story Sharing Your Story … Continue reading Read and Response – Chapter 5: 7 Steps of Digital Storytelling

Video of sunset

I came across this Great Big Story video of a 55 generation family tradition. The Sudo family in Japan has been making sake for over 850 years, and has been directly passed down from generation to generation. https://www.greatbigstory.com/stories/sudo-family-sake Economy: I feel that the economy of the story was very well thought out. We receive a … Continue reading Digital Story Critique

One of the underlying worries I have is that my next child will have autism, and I have no idea how to cope with something like that. Asperger’s runs on both sides of the family, so I know it’s a very real possibility, but each time I think about that possibility I feel guilty that … Continue reading Digital Story Critique – 11/2

One of the more interesting forms of storytelling I feel has come in this past few decades into the public eye is slam poetry. The idea of slam poetry is that the poet or poets perform their pieces before an audience to judge. Most often these types of poetry are centered around some social issue … Continue reading Storytelling Scholarship 10/31

For this weeks assignment I chose the Color Walk Time Lines. The idea was to take a walk of at least 2o minutes and capture 5-8 photographs of a color of your choice. I chose to capture my daily commute. I make this trip 5 times a week twice a day and mostly think about … Continue reading Assignment Bank – Week 10

I came across this story while searching for articles about empowered women, and at 72 years old I would definitely consider Meena Raghavan as such! What I initially noticed was just how athletic she is as a senior citizen. She talks about how Kalaripayattu is part of her culture, and how that aspect of her … Continue reading Digital Story – Week 10

Joe Lambert’s story was the most interesting reading so far I felt. He starts the chapter with an introduction to his childhood state of Texas, and expands upon the ideas and empathy bestowed upon him by his upbringing. I especially like his viewpoint on storytelling, that a good story doesn’t necessarily have a follow some … Continue reading Literature Review – A Road Traveled

9 weeks ago I started my Digital Storytelling course having little knowledge of social media outside of Facebook. I had never kept up a blog, and fumbling my way through some of these assignments was nerve wracking. I don’t have a lot of creativity in my day to day life, I prefer things simple and … Continue reading Mid Point Gallery Walk

I love this picture of our neighborhood. I did not grow up in the US, so when I saw this image down our street I knew I had to grab a picture. To me, this is a quintessential autumn picture of cozy American life. Hometown, USA #TDC1740 #inte5340 pic.twitter.com/eA1gx4h4xr — Kelly Santa Maria (@KelSanMar) October … Continue reading Daily Create 10/13

This week’s digital story critique deals with the horrible topic of pediatric cancer. As the mother of a child who was very very ill for some time (not with cancer), when I first came across this series I was terrified and refused to read anything about it. It was a sort of self preservation of … Continue reading Digital Story Critique – HoNY Pediatric Cancer Series

I have to admit, out of the chapters I have read so far, this one was the least engaging to me. In all honesty, after forcing my way through the first couple of pages I gave up reading the entire article, and instead focuses on the Reflection and Discussion boxes. I used these as a … Continue reading Literature Review Chapter 7

“The consequence of the single story is this, it robs people of their dignity.” As a part of the “normative” American stereotype, I have never had any issue finding stories to which I can relate. White, middle class, nuclear families with 2 kids are a dime a dozen. But are they really? https://www.ted.com/playlists/62/how_to_tell_a_story

I walk along Cherry Creek often, and I found this mural painted along the wall A mural near my work #inte5340 #tdc1725 pic.twitter.com/YBGUZcMJ0n — Kelly Santa Maria (@KelSanMar) September 28, 2016

Have you ever had a recipe passed down through the family? One of my favorite memories was when I became old enough to help my grandmother make the Peking duck. This dinner is a huge deal in our family because it takes so long to make, and a tradition only for family reunions. We start … Continue reading Digital Story Critique #5

I’ve never liked the idea of a remix. I’d only ever heard of remixes on the radio with current musical artists, and I saw it merely as a form of laziness. After reading this chapter I have a little more appreciation for it and a deeper understanding of how it can be used to create … Continue reading Reading Response – Chapters 2 & 3

(Trigger warning: Violent depiction of police brutality and racist language) It seems that each week a new story comes out highlighting another incident of police brutality, another instance of racial injustice. The StoryCorp team decided to showcase the story of one such man who encountered these horrible issues and lived to tell about his experience. … Continue reading Digital Story Critique – Traffic Stop

I selected to do the “Kiss the Guy” audio assignment. The assignment was to replace the actual lyrics of a song with the lyrics you misheard. In this author’s case in the Jimi Hendrix song Purple Haze, instead of hearing “Excuse me, while I kiss the sky” they heard “Excuse me, while I kiss this … Continue reading DS106 Audio Assignment

As I was scanning through articles regarding storytelling, The Science of Storytelling caught my eye. Most of the articles I initially came across were about how to create and craft a compelling story, but this article delved into why we prefer stories as a method of communication. “A story, if broken down into the simplest … Continue reading Response to The Science of Storytelling article

I grew up in a small town where the night stars were visible every clear night. In the town itself street lamps waited on every corner, but hundreds of acres were set aside outside the town for natural forests. No lights were allowed, and the only paths were those made by forest hikers. Now I … Continue reading Our night skies

When working in an office where everything is the same, you need to express your individuality in some way. For me, one of the ways I express myself is by having an array of colored pens. Colored pens are my downfall #inte5340 #tdc1709 pic.twitter.co...

This week’s reflection is over Guy Merchant’s chapter Visual networks: Learning and photosharing The main aspect of this chapter was centered around the photosharing site Flickr. Flickr was once the photosharing site of the internet with it’s original idea of a social site devoted to photosharing. In it’s heyday, Flickr ruled the photosharing business with … Continue reading Visual Networks

I was drawn to this story as the 15th anniversary of 9/11 is coming up this weekend. I remember exactly where I was when I first heard about what was happening in New York, and how helpless I felt not being able to do anything, and wanting to help in some way. I imagine 9/11 … Continue reading Digital Story Critique #2: Food for Firefighters