I loved being a student. Sometimes as a teacher, I’d like to trade places with my students. I enjoy learning. Well in this episode, I get to do just that! Michael Brilla is a fabulous middle school history teacher from Pottstown, Pa. Here’s Michael with his lovely family:

@Mr_Brilla

Michael is my teacher and I’m his student. He’s going to school me about digital storytelling.

I’m reading a fascinating book called Talk Like TED by Carmine Gallo. Carmine evaluates the presentation styles of the most popular TED presenters. One common thread is powerful storytelling. Teachers have a responsibility to help kids evolve as storytellers. It’s an essential skill. Michael Brilla and I became acquainted on Twitter. He promoted the idea of digital storytelling. I was instantly intrigued. Michael’s platform of choice is Knight Lab.

Knight Lab is a free platform gifted to the world from a team of brilliant, talented, and creative faculty and students at Northwestern University. Job 1 when I return to school in one month is to master this powerful platform. I was thrilled to listen to Michael because he’s already utilized it extensively and successfully. In this episode, Michael highlights his student’s creation of Timelines and Story Maps. Please visit these links and marvel at what Michael’s kids created. Digital storytelling has great potential!

Episode Template

The Problem:

Students need to tell more stories.

The Solution:

Utilize Knight Lab and transform your kids into digital bards.

What you can do Tomorrow:

• Play around on the Knight Lab platform.
• Prompt students to illuminate an audience about the steps or stages of a process. It could be an epoch of history, the events in a story, the stages of the scientific process, a story problem in math, the process of completing a recipe or art project.
• Have student teams craft a story that describes each step along the journey.
• Prompt teams to then tell their stories utilizing the Knight Lab platform.

Storytelling is an essential skill. Knight Lab empowers kids to tell their stories in an ultra creative and engaging fashion!

Listen to “105 Knight Lab Transforms your Kids into Digital Bards…Starring Michael Brilla” on Spreaker.