Chiang Mai Stories

While this post will be shared with parents, administrators and teachers around the world, I wanted to start by thanking the student at UWCSEA. Your attention to detail, your artistic integrity, and dedication to hard work has been admirable. I know you have been busy and the demands placed on your shoulders have been heavy, but despite the deadlines and frustrations you have created a beautiful body of work. So thank you.

The idea behind these stories was to look beyond the Single Story of Chiang Mai and create a story that lives between the romanticized version and exploitation of Chiang Mai. It is a story that nobody knows and only you can tell based on your unique experience. We were looking for a few simple things:

1. There is a clear narrative. Your piece tells a story or creates an experience that targets emotions over facts.
2. It is clear that you were composing images, not just taking them. (Rule of Thirds, Use of Perspectives and Angles)
3. Your Digital Story moves beyond a slideshow to show mastery of the form by layering a variety of elements to create a complete piece. (Text, Sound, Video, Images)
4. Your Photo Essay is able to speak for itself and stand alone.  It tells a story or follows a theme.

The results were phenomenal. I often found myself watching with goose bumped skin and tears welling up in my eyes. I know it will be hard for teachers and parents to view all of these amazing tales, so I have listed links below to each class portfolio. Remember that some of the portfolios have more than one page, so click to the next page to see all the videos. Some of the portfolios appear not to have names, but you can find the name of the student if you scroll over the video.

8 SMD
8 GUP
8 ELO
8 GTS
8 RKE
8 WLI
8 MRA
8 JRA

Please take your time and explore these rich tales of our adventure to Chiang Mai. Feel free to leave comments and share with friends and family. There were so many stories to choose from, but I wanted to leave you with a few to get you started: 


I recommend you watch in full screen and with headphones.

Posters for Stories

Hi grade eights!

I know you are super busy and that we keep piling on the work:

1. Digital Stories from Chiang Mai
2. Paragraphs for Murikami and Gish Jen
3. Reading Adiga
4. Portfolios! 

Wow, will it ever end? I have one more thing that needs to get done! By Friday! I know, I know I am sorry.

As your stories come in on Friday, (Or earlier! The sooner we get them the easier things will be) we need a way to share them with people in a non-digital way. While each class will have a portfolio page like these on Vimeo, we still need to direct traffic from the eighth grade pod and the library to these digital spaces. How will we do this I hear you asking? Posters and QR codes.

You have been asked to upload your completed stories to a Google Drive folder that I have shared with you. Please also create a Pages poster. On this poster you must include:

1. An image from your story: Still shot frame or photograph from your story.
2. A title
3. A tag line or piece of text that hooks the reader (Optional)
4. Your name

Here is an example:

Don't worry about the QR code for now. Once I have all the videos uploaded, I will create a table with all the URLs, and I will email instructions on how to create a QR. At which time you will go back into the Drive folder and add the QR code to your poster and come to class on Tuesday with it printed out.

If you can get the video to me before Friday, it will make the entire process much easier. Please add any questions below.

the solar constant

I hope that sharing my digital story from Chiang Mai as you work on your stories will prove to be helpful. Take a look and read the notes following the clip for some advice and tips on your stories.

A few things to keep in mind and notice:

The four elements: 

1. Text- a narration
2. Images- well composed photos
3. Video- to help move the story and give it life
4. Music/sound effects- to add texture and possible narration with lyrics

I chose to create a poem from the Wikipedia page on The Sun as my narration.

The Solar Constant

The Sun formed about 4.6 billion years ago
from the gravitational collapse of a region
within a large molecular cloud.

Most of the matter gathered in the center,
while the rest flattened
into an orbiting disk
that would become
the Solar System.

The Sun
is the star
at the center of the Solar System.
It is almost perfectly spherical
and consists of hot plasma
interwoven with magnetic fields,

She is currently traveling
through the Local Interstellar Cloud
(near to the G-cloud)
in the Local Bubble zone,
within the inner rim
of the Orion Arm
of the Milky Way galaxy.

Sunlight is Earth's primary source of energy.
The solar constant
 is the amount of power
that the Sun deposits
per unit area
that is directly exposed to sunlight.

Earth's ultimate fate is precarious.
By the time it is an asymptotic giant branch star,
the Sun will have lost roughly 30%
of its present mass due to a stellar wind,
so the orbits of the planets will move outward,
The Earth will be swallowed by the Sun owing to tidal interactions

I contrasted this scientific story with random text narration to add a sense of universality and wonder. The next layer were the lyrics from the song Hard Sun. I wanted to add texture and deeper meaning to the running narratives (follow the research to see the connection to this film) By using the sun poem, the random bits of text and this song, I was trying to tell three stories at the same time:

1. Scientific
2. Cosmic
3. Lyrical

The main theme of my story was the fact that the sun is a part of everything on earth. It is a part of us. I felt that the lyrics showed how we are under her power:

There's a big, a big hard sun
Beating on the big people
In the big hard world 

I could have had Eddie Vedder sing the song, but I wanted to give it a try myself. I know I am not the best singer, but I think there is value in trying. I wanted to model for you that you don;t always have to be perfect or great to share a talent and a love. I love to sing. I love music. I love this song and I wanted to give my voice a chance.

I chose soft images to contrast the idea of a hard sun with the reality of a meaningful and tender one. You can find the whole set here. I added video to help move through different parts of the story: 

• Rising sun (Dawn)
• Moving leaves
• Cat
• Caterpillar
• Drive from nature to city
• Butcher
• Drive to village
• Buddha statue
• Sunset

I hope that helps. I do not want to give away too many secrets and hidden intentions. What do you think? What did you notice? What ideas did you gain? What questions do you have? Any feedback?