Listening to our students: what they have to say about digital storytelling

The first quarter of 2023 has been a wonderful whirlwind of time spent with students and teachers in various parts of the world. Along the way, I have been able to coach students of all ages engaged in digital storytelling and active global citizenship, and this post highlights some youth voices in this realm. 

First, check out the video below with Seba, a fifth grade student engaged in telling stories through videos. He created a video about veganism and sustainable food for Impact, his classroom digital storytelling site, and I was thrilled to connect with Seba, his dad and classroom teacher Michele Turner (a passionate storytelling advocate!) on Zoom. The video shares what Seba created and why he thinks digital storytelling is so engaging and important. Deep learning, civic readiness and #techforgood: yes!!

Fast forward to high school. Check out what these high school students from United World College East Africa (Arusha campus) have to say about the power of digital storytelling. The students served on the media team for this year's AISA-GISS 2023 conference in January titled "The Future is Now". AISA stands for the Association of International Schools in Africa and GISS stands for Global Issues Service Summit. This is a powerful gathering of international and local students each year that celebrates active global citizenship and sustainable, inclusive service, and this year's media team was incredible. Check out the summit website to see some of their daily highlight videos. When I was able to talk with Eduardo, Mohamedali and Via about the power of digital storytelling, here's what they had to say: