Photo Story

Microsoft Photo Story is another example of an alternative to written reports that much like the Voki, increases both motivation and retention.  Students create a slideshow and provide narration and background music.  They get to choose the pictures and background music that they feel best expresses their story.  Photo Stories can be either done individually or collaboratively as a class.  I have used both in my classroom.  I had a class of 8th grade students create a Photo Story on WWI.  They each were given a term, event, or person that was involved and had to research it.  They found pictures and facts and recorded their parts individually.  As a class, they searched for and voted on the music and put the final project together.  I also had a 7th grade class complete their own Photo Story individually.  They had to pretend that they were a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition.  They found pictures of animals, plants, and other sights that had not yet been discovered during that time period and created a script that was as if they were writing in their personal journal.  Both classes really enjoyed creating Photo Stories  Here is the link to find out more information as well as download Photo Story 3 for your computer:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/PhotoStory/default.mspx