Yi Zhao

Bio: Yi Zhao is an academic researcher from Harvard University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Digital storytelling & Systemic functional linguistics. The author has an hindex of 1, co-authored 1 publications receiving 5 citations.

Teacher professional identity development through digital stories

Abstract: Digital stories are powerful instructional tools that allow students to communicate complex concepts and emotions through both linguistic and nonlinguistic modes. A digital story is a 3–6 min multimodal video through which students can engage in critical reflection about their experiences, participate actively in the learning process, and give voice to their identities. This study analyzes two digital stories created by teacher education students in a graduate course; using a new framework that draws on Systemic Functional Linguistics, we demonstrate how these beginning teachers used digital storytelling to shape their professional identities. The results show how valuable digital stories can be in fostering reflection and teachers' development as professionals. The paper also introduces and illustrates an innovative systemic functional linguistic approach to analyzing digital stories as complex multimodal objects.

Vol42#1&2 Digital Storytelling in Teacher Education: Creating Transformations through Narrative

Abstract: Stories are important resources in the repertoire of the teacher. Storytelling is a powerful way in which to communicate experiences and to explore ideas. Using stories, the teacher takes her students on journeys of discovery that introduce them to new vistas of lived experience. In this article, we describe how we have used digital storytelling to teach the core values in our field of special education—an approach that honors cultural diversity and empowers students to reflect on and share their experiences. Digital storytelling makes use of a wide variety of techniques including standard storytelling, audioand videorecording, multimedia publication, and shared “mediated” events. In our university-level courses, students watch digital stories as well as create them. We employ a student-directed, inquiry-based approach to digital storytelling that makes the process of storytelling as important as the resulting digital story. Our approach to digital storytelling continues to evolve as new media and technologies emerge that enable new forms of sharing, dissemination, communication, and publication. In this article, we will describe how we have used digital storytelling for inquiry-based learning in university level courses, K–12 schools, and community settings.

Digital storytelling as a tool for reflection in virtual reality projects

Abstract: Reflection is essential for learning and development, especially among middle school students. In this paper, we describe how middle school students can engage in reflective learning by composing digital stories in a project-based learning environment employing virtual reality. Adopting multiple case study methods, we examined the digital stories of five students, together with classroom observations and interviews about their experiences, in order to explore how digital storytelling can allowed students to reflect upon their experiences in a year-end capstone program. Creating digital stories allowed students to 1) reflect on their learning experiences teaching younger students with virtual reality, 2) present their reflections in multiple modalities, and 3) make connections between their present experiences and the past and future. This study demonstrates how digital storytelling can enable multimodal reflection for middle school students, particularly within technology-focused project-based learning environments.

Preparing Teacher Candidates to Implement Digital Storytelling

Abstract: Preparing teachers to integrate technology within their instruction is a longstanding problem of practice, made more challenging chall by the need for hybrid and remote teaching modalities in response to the global pandemic. This case study research examined the ways that integration of digital storytelling into a required literacy and technology teacher education course prepared teacher candidates to integrate digital tools into their instruction. Within the context of a required literacy and technology course, teacher candidates completed digital storytelling projects requiring them to design and compose digital narratives, reflect on the process, and consider the opportunities and implications for integrating digital storytelling within literacy and interdisciplinary instruction. Data were collected from three teacher candidates enrolled in the course and analyzed using qualitative methods. Findings revealed that teacher candidates’ experiences with creating their own digital stories contributed to their developing identities as teachers and influenced their perceptions about the benefits of teaching digital composing in the literacy classroom.

A multimodal model for analyzing middle school English language learners’ digital stories

Abstract: In response to the rapid development of digital literacies, this paper introduces a new multimodal framework for analyzing digital stories. Drawing on systemic functional linguistics, the four-part framework includes representational, interpersonal, compositional, and sociocultural dimensions. Using the analytical framework, this qualitative case study illuminates how two middle school ELLs remixed multimodal semiotic resources to articulate their feelings, develop their identities, and reflect on their learning. Data include classroom observations, semi-structured interviews with students, and digital stories. All were analyzed inductively. Findings demonstrate how articulating voice and communicating feelings often involved “remixing”—a process where ELLs use design thinking to combine new and existing artifacts, and produce new meaning through their digital stories. The analytical framework also illuminates ELLs’ dynamic expressions of and reflection on their identities. The analysis shows how ELLs felt empowered by the opportunity to use digital stories as a platform for sharing their own cultural backgrounds and personal feelings. The study shows how ELLs can benefit from the multimodal literacies afforded by digital storytelling. Our new multimodal analytical framework also demonstrates how a holistic analysis of digital stories can be achieved, and provides guidance on how to support the effective use of digital storytelling as a pedagogical tool for both ELLs and mainstream students.

Implementing ICT in classroom practice: what else matters besides the ICT infrastructure?

Abstract: Abstract Background The large-scale International Computer and Information Literacy Study (2018) has an interesting finding concerning Luxembourg teachers. Luxembourg has one of the highest reported level of technology-related resources for teaching and learning, but a relatively lower reported use of ICT in classroom practice. Methods ICT innovation requires a high initial level of financial investment in technology, and Luxembourg has achieved this since 2015. Once the necessary financial investment in ICT technology has been made, the key question is what else matters to increase the use of ICT in teaching. To identify the relevant factors, we used the “Four in Balance” model, aimed explicitly at monitoring the implementation of ICT in schools. Results Using data for 420 teachers in Luxembourg, we identify that within such a technology-driven approach to digitalization, teachers’ vision of ICT use in teaching, level of expertise , and the use of digital learning materials in class are significant support factors. Leadership and collaboration , in the form of an explicit vision of setting ICT as a priority for teaching in the school, also prove to be important. Conclusions Through these findings, we show that the initial investment in school infrastructure for ICT needs to be associated in its implementation with teachers’ ICT-related beliefs, attitudes, and ICT expertise.