Tagged: digital storytelling

Common Craft inspired students’ video

I am a big fan of Common Craft‘s stop motion instructional/explanatory videos. I find them very engaging and easy to understand.

In June, I worked with 3 pupils to produce a video for National Day Students’ Video Competition. I decided to show them a few Common Craft productions because I thought they may like them. Suddenly, we all decided do our very own Common Craft inspired video!

Instead of the usual filming of role playing, the pupils did something like what Common Craft is really good at – using self-drawn images to tell a story. The theme is “Celebrating Singapore’s Heroes”.

The pupils studied a war heroine, Elizabeth Choy last year, hence it was an easy choice. The pupils started storyboarding, drawing, scripting and narrating. The process was tedious but fun.

My role is to facilitate the technical part – how to do a Common Craft! I tried out some positions with a tripod/camcorder setup but they turned out to be less than perfect. Lightings were dim and I could not get a good top-down vertical angle. In the end, the video seemed like a C grade Common Craft video. 😛

Some photos taken during the production:

The final product:

Now the good news: The pupils won the 3rd Prize! 😀

Tikatok: Publish a book virtually (and for real!)

Just discovered a great writing tool, Tikatok. Strange name but cool idea.

Tikatok is a free creative community for kids under 13 where they can write, illustrate, and share their original stories, and have them printed out into real hardcover and paperback books. It was developed by two mothers to encourage the imagination and creativity of their children and children everywhere.

How it works

These are some of the ways Tikatok helps children unleash their creativity:

  • Kick-start the imagination – Explore a fun collection of interactive story templates called StorySparks™.
  • Build a book – Easily save your words and drawings with a book editor that opens right in the website. No extra software to download or install!
  • Get social – Safely add friends, share favorites, and collaborate with other kids.
  • Show off – See your books on the front page, email them to friends, send them to Tikatok book clubs, and even put them on your blog.
  • Get real – Order any book as a real hardcover or paperback, even single copies! Now you’re a published author.

One lesser known but key feature: It supports Chinese characters! Hurray! 😀