Digital Storytelling in Preservice Teacher Education: Diverse Understandings of Writing, Pedagogy, and Meaning Making

• In Event: 26.079 - Roundtable Session 7
  In Roundtable Session: 26.079-12 - New Literacies in Teacher Preparation

Abstract

This paper examines the role of digital storytelling in pre-service educators’ developing understandings of writing, writing spaces, and pedagogy within and across multiple contexts. Given the affordances of digital storytelling (Beldarrain, 2006; Hofer & Swan, 2006; Ohler, 2013), this case study suggests that digital storytelling in pre-service education can support the development of writing practices and pedagogies that have important applications to future K-12 literacy instruction. Data drawn from five focal undergraduates’ digital stories, discussions, and reflections suggest that digital storytelling supported students’ cross-disciplinary understandings of writing-as-meaning-making by enabling them to communicate using multiple modalities (e.g., video, text, music, special effects). Additionally, regardless of content area, the creation of digital stories helped pre-service educators consider implications for their future practice.

Authors

• Nancy P. Morabito, St. John's University

• Sandra Schamroth Abrams, Saint John's University