Two teams of students from Wayne Elementary School presented projects in the Harrisburg Capitol Rotunda May 23 as part of the Pennsylvania Association for Education and Communications and Technology Student Technology Showcase.

The impetus for this impressive student presentation was the attendance of WES principal Sharon Johns and librarian Susan Dahlstrom at the Temple University’s Powerful Voices for Kids summer camp last year. With help from Joan Cusano, the district director of instructional technology, and her staff, WES was able to integrate the technology required into the curriculum.

A Comic Comes to Life was presented by fifth graders Luke Au, Addison Frazier, Emma James, Timothy Locher, Margaret Packer and Sean Van Trieste, with teacher Enissa Borine. As part of the fifth-grade reading curriculum, students used the computer program Comic Life to explore characterization and setting. Students applied what they learned about character and setting to create a new chapter for The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleischman. Students introduced a new character while maintaining the integrity of the original work, using pre-writing, storyboarding, safe searches, and speech bubbles to create a one-page comic.

Framing Friendship was presented by the second-grade team of Brian Engle, Robert Hobbs, Ryan Hornbaker, Clare McDonald, Sully Sims and Jill Zerkowski, with teacher Ron Gray and student teacher Christy Palmerio. As a component of their “being a writer” curriculum, second graders used Flip cameras to interview older students on the topic of friendship. This approach allowed students to focus on the interview process and to revisit the footage multiple times. A second Flip camera was used by the teacher to record the students as they conducted their interviews. The class analyzed their interviewing skills and reflected on how to make improvements. To involve the whole class in this presentation for the PAECT showcase, one focus group of students assisted with preparing the interview footage, another prepared the display, and the third group presented in Harrisburg.

These projects were made possible by Radnor Educational Foundation and WES PTO grants, which enabled WES to engage in a partnership with the Temple University Media Education Lab, founded by Dr. Renee Hobbs. Emily Bailin and Maggie Riccio from Temple visited WES one day a week for the spring semester, mentoring the faculty in media literacy and designing curricular-based projects.

The PTO has already committed to funding this project for a second year.