Excellent Chart Comparing The Best Digital Storytelling Tools of 2014

Digital storytelling is a powerful way to get students engaged in learning. Using a variety of web tools students will be able to experiment with a set of important skills and literacies in a multimodal environment. They can use text, audio , video, images, among others,  to communicate their ideas, enhance their visual literacy and writing competencies.

There are several reasons why digital story telling is important to students learning. Some of these reasons include:

• It develops creativity and critical thinking.
• Students who are shy or afraid to talk in class get a chance to speak out their minds
• It empowers and provides students to express and share their  voices.
• It helps students explore the meaning of their own experience, give value to it, and communicate that experience with others.
• It develops students communicative skills.
• It is a reflective process that helps students reflect upon their learning and find deep connections. with the subject matter of a course or with an out-of-class experience.
• It fosters students sense of individuality.
• It also gives students an opportunity to experiment with self-representation and establish their identity.

Below are two charts that feature a plethora of digital storytelling web tools to use in class.  The first chart includes my top 4 recommendations for teachers and the second includes other good digital storytelling to try. Stay tuned. MANY MORE charts covering different educational web tools are in the making.

You can access and download the Google Doc version of these charts from this LINK.

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N.S: This chart is inspired by similar charts created by Richard Byrne in Free Technology for Teachers.