The Histories of Revelstoke

Our project outcome report will be built upon our project website and it will feature several components: A website that makes the histories that the students documented during their research and explorations visible to the school and community (Mostly Complete) Website will feature a link to our blog that documents our project steps and progress (To Be Complete) A growing catalogue of the PDFs and audio recordings from the interviews recorded in the 1970's.  ' Marjorie Parker ' is a test.   (Ongoing). Some student testimonials (video clips or written testimonials) discussing the projects and the experience of our journey into the history of Revelstoke. (Not started)

During this project, students created a variety of artifacts in both digital and 'analogue' forms.  Some of the projects included the following: To Digital: Creating PDF files from typed transcripts of recorded conversations Catalogued for the Revelstoke Museum and Archives (RMA) Creating digital audio files from cassette tapes and reel-to-reel machines A continuing project for the RMA Uploading stories and images to a website for sharing with our school community, patrons of the RMA, and beyond.  There were other online presentations that were linked to the website. Marjorie Parker: Audio File Marjorie Parker: PDF To Analogue: Researching stories and photos in books and from online sources and creating an interactive, pop-up museum. Here are some photos of a board game, some re-created and re-imagined character letters and maps from the period, and an informational display.

Our project used formative and summative assessment along with peer evaluation.  Students created pop-up museum exhibits and presented them to the class.  The exhibits had to meet ten criteria, including an interactive component and some audio-visual features. Peer evaluation and self-evaluation was used to provide feedback on visual communication, written fluency, storytelling, and other aspects.  Additionally, a website is being developed to house all the artifacts and stories which will be linked to the school website and the website of the local museum. With the end of Semester 1, work on this project is now migrating from Julia's classroom to the library.  A few students from the Writing 12 class have Library Support blocks and these students will use some of their time to continue the archival work on the audio recordings and continuing the work needed to publish and refine the work on our histories.  There are a few new students working in the library who will complete s

Today, we previewed Anton's design work for the webpage that will host our content.  He is coding this site in JavaScript we all liked it's interactive, fluid design.  Here is his mock-up: We also started a second site using Google Sites as well.  This site will be an easier site to manage, it will be up and running sooner, it's free (Google hosts the site) and it will help us organize our material for Anton's effort.  Here is the link . We are also continuing to digitize museum recordings and photographs.  For this process, we've used GarageBand, Audacity (open-source recording software), and Photoshop. Students have been creating installations for our pop-up museum.  We've had classroom presentations and some of the artifacts are now on display in our school trophy cases. Students have also used online applications like Prezi, and desktop applications like Excel to create timelines in their multi-media presentations.

The Revelstoke Museum and Archives has loaned us a Sony Reel-to-Reel Audio Recorder, and Mr. Wilson pulled a cassette player from his basement so we could digitize some of the old audio recordings. We've been using desktops to record the files using GarageBand or Audacity (an open-source audio program), and the laptops have been used to process the mp3 files that we've generated. The museum has provided us with several sources for these audio recordings: CD - A digital format, easy to convert and use Cassette Tape - A magnetic tape format that is also fairly easy to digitize because the amplifier on the tape player gives a signal strength that is easily picked up by the software Reel-to-Reel - Low signal strength from the audio tapes makes this harder to record.  We'll explore amplifiying the signal with a second amp to see if that helps preserve these recordings.  It is also possible that the reels have deteriorated over time.

As preparation for our work with the curation and presentation of the stories we have been entrusted with, we walked downtown to visit the Revelstoke Museum and Archives. Curator Cathy English spoke to us about her process for preparing museum exhibits.  She explained to us the whole process she used to create the exhibit Land of Thundering Snow, which is both a physical exhibit at our local museum and an online project through the Canadian Virtual Museum . Here are some of the student responses from the trip: "Cathy brought to light the creative process that goes into creation exhibitions and just how different museum writing is from academic essays or creative writing," said Hannah. Christina thought "we learned about the power of words; more is not always better," she said. Hallah agreed that learning "how to say more and write less" was a valuable lesson. Maddy was impressed with the Land of Thundering Snow exhibit because of "the many

I n Writing 12, Marissa Tiel the editor of the local newspaper, The Revelstoke Times-Review, came to speak to us about what her job was like.  We learned about her training and experience, but more importantly, she taught us about literary journalism which seemed to really inspire some people.  It made technical writing seem less dry. We will use these ideas for our class project. 

The equipment from SET-BC has arrived!  📹😀📷

Today's lesson in digital citizenship touched on several points. Images, Art, and Copyright Mr. Wilson showed us the photos that were added to the sidebar of our blog, and then he related his discussions with Cathy English at the Revelstoke Museum & Archives about the use of these photos on our blog. The photos are not copyrighted, but Ms. English did indicate that it would be a kind of moral wrong if, say, Mr. Wilson were to use these photos to make Christmas cards and sell them for profit.  In an online environment, we wondered if the museum could explore copyright as an option. For the time being, we have indicated that these photos are the property of the museum. Ms. Crucil also discussed the challenges facing artists online.  Marketing artwork places your ideas and creative work online which makes it vulnerable to theft or misuse. Consent and Digital Images SET-BC has asked us to complete forms that allow the use of digital images of project participants.  We d

Julia, Michael, and Jeff met with Monica Lee and the other group leaders. We learned about the themes and explorations for the other projects.

This week we spent some time analyzing the structure and sonic qualities of podcasts.  Many of the popular, free, and entertaining podcasts we listened to were filled with great storytelling techniques including interviews, quotes, foreshadowing, emotional appeals, and exposition.  We looked at the ways that voice, music, and sounds are used to tell a story, and then we set out to make some podcasts of our own.  The task was to interview either an alien, robot, monster, or a squirrel.  Using Garage Band, we created our podcasts on the school iPads so we could experiment with the software in a fun way.  This is one example of the podcasts we created, masterfully executed by Charlotte and Maddy: