Instructions

The idea for this wiki and the basis for the project was inspired by Karen Ditzler’s Progressive Story Project. I have participated in this great project several times with mixed success. I immediately saw the value in the project so I decided to try the project on a smaller scale within my own school district.

The SD33 Story Project is a collaborative story writing project which encourages student/teacher collaboration, creativity, imagination, and utilizes the latest digital storytelling techniques.
 * Scope of the project: **

** Phase 1: **
Four schools are grouped together to form a story writing quad. Next, a lead teacher is selected to facilitate the project. The first school’s whole-class start the project by developing a new story and introduce some characters. Once the first school has finished their introduction they post the beginning of the story on the wiki for the other three schools to view. Finally, the first school will fulfill their obligation by illustrating three/four scenes taken from their introduction, and either upload here or email them to the teacher facilitator. They can use a variety of mediums including, pencil crayons, paint, charcoal, plasticine, and digital images. Once all illustrations are collected the teacher facilitator will upload to VoiceThread. The three remaining schools then complete their parts of the story by the story deadline, in exactly the same way. When all four parts of the story are completed, and all illustrations have been added to the VoiceThread, each school takes turns narrating the story in the VoiceThread while the illustrations move from beginning to end.

===It is possible to complete a SMART sequence after each part. Each part of the story would represent one chunk of the story. If you follow the SMART framework, then here is a link to a simplified fluency log===


 * Activities: (For each phase and each group) **


 * During Reading Activities: (for groups that are just reading each part and aren't necessarily writing) **
 * SMART - Using our senses (When I read the story ___ by__ these are the ...)
 * SMART - Sketch and Show
 * SMART - Wonderings


 * Pre Writing Activities: (so each class would be doing this at different times, depending on what portion they're writing) **
 * SMART - Facts and Inferences
 * SMART - What's important and Why?
 * possibly recreate a story planner???


 * Post Writing Activities: **
 * draw pictures for story
 * record voices for VoiceThread


 * Post Project Activities: **
 * Finish VoiceThread
 * Skype with others about process (see reflecting on learning examples below)
 * Write to each class telling them what you liked about their portion of the story (individual letters?)

Note: The timing of the activities will vary depending on which part of the story your class is writing.

**Example VoiceThread**: (If VoiceThread does not appear - make sure you have an updated version of Flash installed.)

media type="custom" key="17241450"

**Phase 2:**
Identical in every way to Phase 1, instead this time your class will brake out into smaller groups - around 5 students. In each group there should be a strong creative writer, a fluent reader, and an illustrator. These five students will work on a story with five students from the other three schools.

**Phase 3**:
Let's build this together! Perhaps we could shift focus from fiction story-writing to developing non-fiction collaborative writing techniques and skills...

Assessment:

 * Students will reflect on their learning, with the teachers help, in their own classroom
 * Students will connect via Skype to reflect on their learning. Possible discussion questions may include, What did story creation look like in your classroom? What was easy? What did you find difficult? What new skills have you developed? What areas do you need to improve in next time? What was fun and why?
 * Assessing classroom activities