Category Archives: DOABLE approach

six steps to the DOABLE approach to telling your family’s tales

StoryCorps: Education

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StoryCorps has several programs designed to help educators. Stories are powerful way to teach not only history but also help student learning interviewing methods and the value of listening. Here are some of StoryCorps educational programs:

  • StoryCorpsU has developed a dynamic College Readiness Curriculum as well as resources to help educators use StoryCorps content and interviewing techniques in their classrooms. Read more.
  • The “Introduction to StoryCorps Lesson Plan” is a customizable lesson plan for students in grades 8-12 that is designed to teach students interviewing and storytelling skills using StoryCorps content. In the 2 activities, students are asked to participate effectively in a variety of interactions (one-on-one and in groups), exchanging information to advance a discussion and to build on the input of others. This lesson plan also includes a list of recommended recordings, organized by themes of relevance and interest to young people.

Download the lesson plan here.

StoryCorps has lots of great resources for anyone working on a story project. Take some time to explore their website.

 

StoryCorps: Listen

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Here is StoryCorps‘ purpose in their own words:

Our mission is to provide people of all backgrounds and beliefs with the opportunity to record, share, and preserve the stories of our lives.

Since 2003 they have recorded more than 45,000 stories. That is a lot of stories! Wow. Here is one that seems particularly appropriate today.

“He’s the reason I’m here. ”

Constance Labetti remembers her boss, Ron Fazio, who died in the World Trade Center attacks on September 11, 2001.

http://storycorps.org/listen/.

StoryCorps: How-To Video

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StoryCorps sponsors a national day of listening each year. This year’s day is November 29th. They have put together a how-to video for a successful recording session. Here are the key points from the video.

  • Pick a story-teller
  • Question list
  • Equipment
  • Choose a quiet room
  • Testing 1 2 3
  • Begin the conversation
  • Wrapping it up

StoryCorps: Animated Shorts

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One of the things that StoryCorps has done is make animated shorts from some of the favorite stories. Here is one of them. Below is a link to all their animated shorts.

Eyes on the Stars

On January 28, 1986, NASA Challenger mission STS-51-L ended in tragedy when the shuttle exploded 73 seconds after takeoff. On board was physicist Ronald E. McNair, who was the second African American to enter space. But first, he was a kid with big dreams in Lake City, South Carolina.

Animated Shorts on StoryCorps

I would love to try doing a short animated video someday. I don’t really know what it takes but it looks like lots of fun. What about you, do you have a story that would be great as an short animated video?

 

StoryCorps – Great Questions

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  • What was the happiest moment of your life?
  • What are you most proud of?
  • What are the most important lessons you’ve learned in life?
  • What is your earliest memory?
  • How would you like to be remembered?

Have you every visited StoryCorps.org? It is a great site dedicated to recording everyone’s story. One of their resources is list of great questions to help uncovering someones story. You can use their Question Generator tool to help you create a list of questions to take to your StoryCorps interview. Then you can print the customized list or have it emailed to you. It takes about 15 minutes and it helps you to pick areas to cover in your interview. They also have list of questions that you can just look at and use or get inspiration from. Here are the basic areas of questions:

As we were driving home from taking Bill’s mom out to eat for her birthday it occurred to me that maybe I should start asking her some questions about her life to start a history for her. I was thinking of doing it by email. Do you have someone who you would like to interview about their life and their story?

 

Zodiac Time-lapse Project

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Back in May of 2012 I wrote a post about a cool time-lapse project. It inspired me to try my own time-lapse project with Zodiac. I did pretty good at getting a video clip of Zodiac most weeks while he was growing up. I didn’t get a chance to work on it before he left and it was on the back burner all summer until we got the news he was doing in-home training. That pushed it to the urgent category on my to do list.

Photo & Video Sharing by SmugMug

click on photo to link to video

 

I’ve never done any video editing so I had lots to learn. I first tried to use the slide show software that I have but that couldn’t handle the project at all. I have a very old version of Adobe Premiere Pro so I installed that I started reading the manual. Premiere Pro was surprisingly intuitive and most of the basics was pretty easy to figure out. I didn’t try to get fancy with anything but it came out pretty good considering my lack of experience, the quality of the video (just shot with my basic digital camera) and the not so good lighting or set up I had.

I didn’t try to do this for Dune (which I’m kind of sad about) but I want to do something for Pup “E” coming next Friday. I’m just not sure how I want to do it. I don’t want to do it the same way. While I’m pretty happy with how it turned out, it isn’t really what I was hoping for. I want a way to capture how the puppies grow and change over the year that we have them. I’ve got seven days to come up with a plan. Anybody have any suggestions?

A Little Bittle of Summer

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image from Blurb.com

I came across this writing exercise from Blurb’s August Newsletter today and wanted to share it here. They suggest writing about your summer but you could also use this approach on any subject or person you having been wanting to do a story project about.

Here’s a brand-new writing exercise to help you capture the summer of 2013 and inspire a bit of a creative energy. As the season fades and we head indoors to hibernate for the winter, this exercise can help you get the most from your memories and make sure they’re not lost forever.

Visual references can be powerful catalysts for writing; photographs, illustrations, and visuals can often help to overcome writer’s block. A train or bus ticket, a menu, a business card, an eye-catching flyer—these are just a few examples of the visual references we collect as we move around in the world. When combined with the images we deliberately record with our cameras, these accidental souvenirs can serve as powerful reminders of particular moments in time.

Using visual cues like these in your writing exercises is a great way to get started on a book—or to just ignite the spark that gets your creative fire burning.

  • Select several of your most treasured objects, accidental souvenirs, and images from your summer activities.
  • Play with some ideas. Will this piece of writing document an event or set of events? Is it a poem, a short story, or something else? Decide on your approach, process, and genre.
  • Write for a fixed amount of time, say 20 to 30 minutes, and see where it takes you. Repeat until you feel you’ve captured what’s in your head on the page (or screen).
  • Refine the results. Keep editing and refining until you’re satisfied with the words and then dive straight into making your book. Now is the time to weave in your visual cues. Get your photographs, drawings, artifacts—whatever inspired you—into digital format and import them into your book project.
  • Explore different layouts to create the best combinations of your words and images

It may take it a week or two—or if you’re incredibly efficient, an hour or two—but once your Summer 2013 book is finished you’ll have secured some special memories in print. (You can also create an ebook version in a flash.) After all, as Henry David Thoreau once said, “One must maintain a little bittle of summer, even in the middle of winter.”

Now I just need to carve out a few minutes and try this exercise. It’s a good friend’s daughter passed away and they are asking for memories to put together for her brand new baby so that he will know about his mother. This would be a great things to do for that project.

Are you up to a writing challenge too? If I can do it so can you. Writing is one of my big mental blocks.

 

RootsTech 2014 – registration now open

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Registration is now open for RootsTech 2014, which will be held February 6­-8, 2014 at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. This annual family history conference, hosted by FamilySearch, is a unique global event where people of all ages learn to discover and share their family stories and connections through technology. Over the past three years, RootsTech has grown in popularity with attendees to become the largest family history event in the United States!

Whether attendees are just beginning their family history, an avid hobbyist, or an experienced researcher, RootsTech has something for everyone:

  • Classes and Computer Labs —Over 200 classes and computer labs taught by knowledgeable experts and enthusiasts in family history.
  • Getting Started Track —A track of over 30 classes designed to help beginners start their family tree. Passes start at only $19.
  • Developer Day —A preconference event on Wednesday, February 5, for developers to innovate and collaborate with other engineers and family history industry experts.
  • Expo Hall —A huge expo with over 100 informative vendors and interactive booths where attendees can record a family story, scan a book or photo, or create a visual family tree.
  • Family Discovery Day —New! A day of free inspirational classes for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to learn more about strengthening family relationships across generations through family history.

Pass Pricing and Discounts

Various pass options are available, with pricing set to make RootsTech an affordable experience. Early Bird pricing discounts for a Full Access Pass ($159) and a Getting Started Pass ($39) are available until January 6, 2014.

An additional $20 discount is available for a limited time. Attendees can get a Full Access Pass for just $139 simply by using the promotional code RT14EXCLSV before September 9, 2013.

To get more information and register, visit rootstech.org.

 

25% off Blurb Books

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Here is a great discount from Blurb.com!

Close the book on summer with 25% off any print book

25 percent. That’s about how much of the year is left. And that means summer’s almost over. Yeah, we’re not too thrilled about it either. Because we had a great summer here at Blurb.

We made books, read books, sold books. It was a summer for the books, you might say. (Well, you might not say it, but we did.)

So to commemorate our amazing summer—and yours, we hope—we’re going to do something special to help you fall into autumn (see what we did there?) with a finished book that you made yourself. We’re having a Summer Sunset Flash Sale.

Get 25% off ANY print book. Five days only. Use code SUNSET25 at checkout.

Say goodbye to summer and hello to a great book. Yours. Five days only: August 27–31. Use code
SUNSET25 at checkout.

For the next five days, you can take 25 percent off any print book. Already started one? Finish it and take 25 percent off. Been meaning to start one? Gather up those summer photos, make an instant book, and take 25 percent off. Just use code SUNSET25 at checkout.