So
how could we reach a generation that's tuned out to the traditional
media? We decided to take the best of what works in traditional media
and give it a technological twist.
Enter Fotobabble, a cloud-based social media app that allows students to use a photograph secured from an online news source and then narrate their own story. Students had to seek out a photograph of a news story from a legitimate media source and then write their own "story" about what was happening in the news. The exercise forced the students to seek out news for their own assignment and then summarize in their own words and their own voice.
Once they had the story "written," they had to read their story aloud and record it over the picture. The recording was easy. They simply had to record their voice into the built-in microphone on their computer. Several students opted to use either an iPad or iPhone, both of which have built-in mics.
Enter
Enter Fotobabble, a cloud-based social media app that allows students to use a photograph secured from an online news source and then narrate their own story. Students had to seek out a photograph of a news story from a legitimate media source and then write their own "story" about what was happening in the news. The exercise forced the students to seek out news for their own assignment and then summarize in their own words and their own voice.
Once they had the story "written," they had to read their story aloud and record it over the picture. The recording was easy. They simply had to record their voice into the built-in microphone on their computer. Several students opted to use either an iPad or iPhone, both of which have built-in mics.
After
finishing their story, the students embedded the Fotobabble into
Blackboard.
Students had to write a headline and offer a credit line to their source. The headline had to consist of more than three or four key words. The headline had to get the reader's attention, just as a headline in a newspaper or an online publication would. We graded them on their content, story structure and flow and their ability to hook their audience's attention in the lead. We then asked students to watch their peers' Fotobabbles. Students then had to comment on their peers' work for five possible points each week, and on Thursday, we opened class with Poll Everywhere. We used the tool to allow us to poll the students on the top stories of the week and select one story as the most newsworthy. Students told us in an evaluation that they wanted more time to discuss several of the top stories and debate why the winner was more newsworthy than the competitors.
At first, some of the comments were little more than token words like, "I like your story." However, by the end of the semester, students questioned their peers about their news value judgement, the story's flow or even the tone of voice delivery for the story.
Of course, innovating doesn't come without challenges and issues.
Issues: Technology, fear of their voice, fear of failure (theirs and ours). We incorrectly assumed that students were more technologically-sound than they really are. Students did not know how to embed the codes from Fotobabble into the Blackboard blog, and we had to write two separate sets of instructions before everyone figured it out. Students also had trouble with various browsers. Some students couldn't get Firefox to work, but others had no issue. Most students had issues with Google Chrome. We asked students to embed their Fotobabbles into a page on Blackboard. Initially, we had set up Journals, but we found that the Journal function in Blackboard was too clunky for the students to operate and only helped us as the professors. We opted then for the Blog function, so that the students could watch all their peers' Fotobabbles and offer comments.
Students initially were scared to record their voice and have their peers listen to their Fotobabbles. The instructors explained to the classes that no one likes the sound of his/her voice at first, and we set rules that explained no one could take "pot shots" at a person's voice in the comment section. For future consideration, we may not make the students write comments on the stories as several students expressed concern that the comments came across as "fake."
Results: Overall, students seemed to like the Fotobabble assignment. The instructors assigned it a weekly score of 20 possible points and used a rubric to make the grading easier. In order to score 20 points, students had to write a headline, write a source for their photo, write and narrate their story, comment on blogs and be present in class each Thursday for voting. If converted to a 100-point scale, the class average for the assignment in Wright's section was an 89, and the average for Price's section was 87. Both sections recorded drops near the end of the semester as students either failed to follow through with comments or failed to attend both class sessions. In previous semesters, Wright's average on current events quizzes fell to a 65 to 70, when the 5-point quizzes are converted to a 100-point scale.
Future: Based on the success of the Fotobabbles in engaging students in understanding and consuming news, Wright and other professors will use the assignment again in the introductory classes this fall. The assignment helped students to understand why current events matter in their own lives and how they can apply the traditional news values (timeliness, proximity, etc.) to their view of current events. The exercise also forced the students to explore a variety of online news sources to find their photos and their stories. As such, they spent more time engaged in finding and consuming news stories. Several students branched out from stand-by news sources such as CNN.com to international news sources when they chose to write about foreign affairs.
One of the challenges this fall will come with the transition from Blackboard to Canvas, a new learning management system. The Fotobabbles may become part of the blog assignment for the 100- and 200-level writing classes. The Fotobabbles can be imbedded into a blog or shared on a class Facebook page or Twitter feed. Students will still have to write and produce one Fotobabble each week.
Wright and other journalism professors plan to use Fotobabbles as a scaffolding to additional convergent media technologies in the upper-level writing and reporting classes. By introducing students to a convergent tool in the beginning classes, students become more adept at thinking about writing and producing news across media platforms (print, broadcast, online and mobile). Journalists in today's newsrooms are asked to write, edit and produce a variety of content for the traditional mediums of print and broadcast, and thus, we must teach those skills early in their academic career. As more papers transition from a print-only business model to a digital-first business model, future reporters must be comfortable with multiple storytelling methods.
Students had to write a headline and offer a credit line to their source. The headline had to consist of more than three or four key words. The headline had to get the reader's attention, just as a headline in a newspaper or an online publication would. We graded them on their content, story structure and flow and their ability to hook their audience's attention in the lead. We then asked students to watch their peers' Fotobabbles. Students then had to comment on their peers' work for five possible points each week, and on Thursday, we opened class with Poll Everywhere. We used the tool to allow us to poll the students on the top stories of the week and select one story as the most newsworthy. Students told us in an evaluation that they wanted more time to discuss several of the top stories and debate why the winner was more newsworthy than the competitors.
Of course, innovating doesn't come without challenges and issues.
Issues: Technology, fear of their voice, fear of failure (theirs and ours). We incorrectly assumed that students were more technologically-sound than they really are. Students did not know how to embed the codes from Fotobabble into the Blackboard blog, and we had to write two separate sets of instructions before everyone figured it out. Students also had trouble with various browsers. Some students couldn't get Firefox to work, but others had no issue. Most students had issues with Google Chrome. We asked students to embed their Fotobabbles into a page on Blackboard. Initially, we had set up Journals, but we found that the Journal function in Blackboard was too clunky for the students to operate and only helped us as the professors. We opted then for the Blog function, so that the students could watch all their peers' Fotobabbles and offer comments.
Students initially were scared to record their voice and have their peers listen to their Fotobabbles. The instructors explained to the classes that no one likes the sound of his/her voice at first, and we set rules that explained no one could take "pot shots" at a person's voice in the comment section. For future consideration, we may not make the students write comments on the stories as several students expressed concern that the comments came across as "fake."
Results: Overall, students seemed to like the Fotobabble assignment. The instructors assigned it a weekly score of 20 possible points and used a rubric to make the grading easier. In order to score 20 points, students had to write a headline, write a source for their photo, write and narrate their story, comment on blogs and be present in class each Thursday for voting. If converted to a 100-point scale, the class average for the assignment in Wright's section was an 89, and the average for Price's section was 87. Both sections recorded drops near the end of the semester as students either failed to follow through with comments or failed to attend both class sessions. In previous semesters, Wright's average on current events quizzes fell to a 65 to 70, when the 5-point quizzes are converted to a 100-point scale.
Future: Based on the success of the Fotobabbles in engaging students in understanding and consuming news, Wright and other professors will use the assignment again in the introductory classes this fall. The assignment helped students to understand why current events matter in their own lives and how they can apply the traditional news values (timeliness, proximity, etc.) to their view of current events. The exercise also forced the students to explore a variety of online news sources to find their photos and their stories. As such, they spent more time engaged in finding and consuming news stories. Several students branched out from stand-by news sources such as CNN.com to international news sources when they chose to write about foreign affairs.
One of the challenges this fall will come with the transition from Blackboard to Canvas, a new learning management system. The Fotobabbles may become part of the blog assignment for the 100- and 200-level writing classes. The Fotobabbles can be imbedded into a blog or shared on a class Facebook page or Twitter feed. Students will still have to write and produce one Fotobabble each week.
Wright and other journalism professors plan to use Fotobabbles as a scaffolding to additional convergent media technologies in the upper-level writing and reporting classes. By introducing students to a convergent tool in the beginning classes, students become more adept at thinking about writing and producing news across media platforms (print, broadcast, online and mobile). Journalists in today's newsrooms are asked to write, edit and produce a variety of content for the traditional mediums of print and broadcast, and thus, we must teach those skills early in their academic career. As more papers transition from a print-only business model to a digital-first business model, future reporters must be comfortable with multiple storytelling methods.
In addition, the Fotobabble could become a tool for campus publications. Because it's an app that can be downloaded onto an iPhone or iPad, student journalists could snap a photo at an event (a presidential lecture, a football game, a wreck) and quickly narrate a 30-second story before sharing it via Facebook or Twitter. The beauty of this exercise is that it would make student journalists have to snap a photo of a breaking news event, quickly pull together a brief story and immediately share it with their audience, all from a few taps on their smartphone or tablet.
