November 23, 2006 | Read Time: 1 minute
Believing that stories are the most powerful teachers, the nonprofit group Curriki, in Washington, has enlisted 15 filmmakers in developing countries to produce short narrative videos designed to help students learn about strife and poverty across the globe.
Each of the two- to five-minute pieces — which blend photos, music, voice-overs, and printed text — focuses on one of four “millennium development goals” set forth by the United Nations: eradicating poverty, combating diseases, promoting education, and cultivating the environment.
An example is the video by Hauwa Ashley Umar, from Nigeria, who used shots of maps, mosquitoes, and hospital wards to tell the story of her brother, who died of malaria three years ago. She has since dedicated herself to educating Nigerians about malaria.
Most of the filmmakers are 20 to 25 years old and had no artistic experience, says Bobbi L. Kurshan, executive director of Curriki, which provided digital cameras to participants. “Digital storytelling has become extremely important in teaching school today; the best teachers are the ones who tell good stories.” She hopes the videos — known collectively as the Tapestry Project — will reach a global audience that can gain access to them through the Internet.
All the movies are open-source, meaning any teacher can copy, alter, or adapt them. The charity’s name, Curriki, in fact is a variation of Wikipedia, the open-source Internet encyclopedia.
For more information: Go to http://www.un.org/youthsummit/gallery.asp?page=GalleryDigStory.
