MD Digital Learning Standard #6- Creative Communicator

By Kerri Lambert, Teacher Specialist, AACPS Office of Instructional Technology

This is the sixth post in a series about the Maryland Digital Learning Standards. 

If you’ve been following along in our series of blog posts about the Maryland Digital Learning Standards, one thing should be clear by now. It is that the standards are designed to encourage students to be active learners, concerned with building their own knowledge base and creating content; not simply consuming it. This is particularly true of Standard 6: Creative Communicator. Let’s take a closer look, but first, the standard as it’s written: 

6. Creative Communicator

Students communicate clearly and express themselves creatively using the platforms, tools, styles,
formats and digital media appropriate for their goals. Students:

a) choose the appropriate approved platforms and tools for meeting the desired objectives of their creation and/or communication;

b) create original works or responsibly repurpose or remix digital resources;

c) communicate complex ideas clearly and effectively by creating or using a variety of digital content such as visualizations, models or simulations; and

d) publish or present content that customizes the message and medium for their intended audiences.

While this standard is fairly straight forward, it’s important to note one very key detail. And that is? The fact that the standard nowhere states “write, or writer” instead opting to utilize the vocabulary “communicator and communicate.” 

Why is this so important? Because the standards recognize that students must be versed in sharing their information and knowledge in a variety of ways, not just through text. Does this mean that students shouldn’t be writing and using word processing programs? Of course not! Those are important skills to have, but so is the ability to communicate in other ways such as graphic design, charts, and video. In this day and age of Instagram stories, TikTok, and 24 hour news media, people must be able to communicate their ideas in short snippets. Teaching our students how to communicate beyond the standard 5 paragraph essay is critical and digital tools are very much a key component to teaching them those skills. 

So, aside from the standard typing out a story or creating a slide deck presentation, what can an AACPS educator do to help their students become a creative communicator? Here are five ideas that can be used across content areas and grade levels.

Blogging

As the internet has grown over the years, people no longer have to have a publisher, write letters to the editor, or call into radio stations to make their voices heard. Now, anyone can start a blog to share their ideas, opinions, recipes, or life stories with the world. This is why having students craft a blog post is a great exercise and real world skill. It particularly works well to meet indicator d of the Creative Communicator standard where students are required to “publish or present content that customizes the message and medium for their intended audiences.” Students can blog independently or as a class. The blog can take place in present day, or simulate a time past. Instead of having students write a research paper on the revolutionary war, why not have them blog from the perspective of a loyalist or patriot? Doing a science experiment? Have them blog their observations and conclusions as the experiment proceeds. Writing a personal narrative? Have them share via a blog post to encourage creative storytelling. When laying out the parameters of the blog post, don’t forget to give students a specific audience to write for so they can tailor the tone, examples, and point of view accordingly. 

Blogging is the simplest way to get started in meeting Standard 6; it’s similar to the types of writing we’ve been assigning students since the dawn of formal education. The difference? It allows students to share their thoughts with others outside the teacher. It also gives students the opportunity to add visuals such as images, graphs, and charts depending on their audience. Students can create a blog in any number of approved AACPS platforms depending on their level of comfort. Google Docs, Slides, and Sites can all be used to create a blog. Younger students can blog using Wixie. Want to mix it up a bit? Give students the option of a Vlog, or video vlog. Students can record informal videos using WeVideo, Wixie, or even their personal devices and post in any of the platforms mentioned above. It’s very TikToky! 

Infographics

Infographics are a visual depiction of data and information that utilizes charts, images, icons, and small bits of text to convey meaning. While this may seem simple at first, it requires a great deal of skill to choose the perfect images and create easy to read graphs and charts that convey key ideas and information to the reader. Intimidated by the idea? There’s no need to be; this is just an evolution of the poster project that we’ve been assigning to students for decades. To help scaffold the process of creating an infographic, provide students with templates from Adobe Express or Wixie to guide them. If your students feel comfortable starting from scratch, then Adobe Express and Google Drawings give students blank, adjustable sized canvases with extensive drawing tools and font choices to help make an eye-catching infographic. 

Videos

It’s no secret that videos are where it’s at when it comes to learning new information these days. In fact, if I were to ask you where you go first to learn how to do something, I bet you would answer YouTube. You wouldn’t be alone in that response; according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2018, over half of the adults in the United States say they turn to YouTube to learn how to do something. Creating a video can require a lot more than just turning on a camera and saying action. Extensive planning of both visuals and audio using a storyboard is important. This planning or sequencing of the video requires careful consideration of visuals, narration, music, and text overlays to carefully craft the message they want their viewers to hear.  Point of view, tone, and theme are all literacy concepts traditionally associated with story writing that must be contemplated when storyboarding to make sure the message and information the students want to convey are easily understood by the viewer. WeVideo is our main video editor in AACPS; however, Adobe Express can also be used if you want something simpler. Both applications have extensive built in media libraries with still images, video clips, music, and audio files that students can use to craft their Academy-Award winning videos. WeVideo even provides you with an assignment idea library that include templates and pre-filled media options for students to use. 

Podcasting

Do you like the idea of students expressing themselves verbally but want something a bit simpler to start? Then consider having your students create a podcast instead. Since a podcast is audio only, it allows students to focus on the script. Oftentimes, podcasts involve a conversation between two or more people, so this is a great option for fostering collaboration. Interviewing an expert is a simple way to get started in this medium. Crafting questions to elicit the response they want from the expert requires research and critical thinking, two very important skills. Podcasts are also a great storytelling medium; rather than have your students simply compose a story in a word processing program like Google Docs or MS Word, consider having them take it a step further by recording it as a podcast. This brings in the ideas of using music and audio to enhance the story to convey tone, but also the idea of acting and reading fluency. For podcasting, we recommend using WeVideo; want a visual cover for the podcast? Students can create one in Adobe Express using one of their many templates to get started. 

Digital Modeling

Bridge model created in Minecraft

Indicator c of the learning standard specifically calls out students’ ability to use “visualizations, models or simulations” to communicate complex ideas. Does this one leave you scratching your head? It’s actually not as complicated as you may think. Basically, students need to use digital tools to create graphs, charts, and models of their ideas. When data is involved, you can never go wrong with creating graphs and charts in Google Sheets or MS Excel. When creating graphs and charts, students need to think about scale, labels, even how color can affect the message the data is conveying to others. It’s not as cut and dry as one might think! For modeling, students can draw their ideas in a digital program like Wixie or use Minecraft to build a 3D representation of their idea. Simulations can get a bit trickier, but all of our schools have access to Sphero robots; indi is in all elementary schools, Bolt in middle schools, and RVR in high schools. Students can code a robot to simulate a situation, story, or event to communicate their ideas. They can even code indi to model how to fluently read or map out phonemes (for more, watch this amazing webinar from Sphero)!

Bottom line, when it comes to making sure our students are prepared for the world outside school, they must be able to articulate their thoughts in a variety of ways. As our society continues to consume information through multimedia outlets, our students must be versed in communicating their ideas and learning using digital tools beyond the traditional written word. Maryland Digital Learning Standard 6 is in place to set guidelines for making that happen.