StoryVisualizer by LEGO Education: Using Digital Storytelling to Integrate STEM and Literacy

Introduction

Jonah* sat in the back of the classroom with his head down on his desk, his hands hidden from view fidgeting with several LEGOs, waiting for the bell to ring. His teacher, Ms. Martinez, was engaging the whole class in a science lesson from the newly purchased district curriculum. As she defined the science terms from the lesson to the class, she noticed Jonah fiddling with something in his desk. Frustrated with Jonah’s lack of focus and attentiveness, Ms. Martinez walked over, put her hand out, and quietly said, “No toys at school, Jonah.”

Like many children in K-12 schools today, Jonah is a complex modern child with a plethora of experiences, interests, and expertise. Yet, standardized and compartmentalized curricula, often purchased and mandated by schools, often limit what teachers can do in order to motivate and engage the whole child in learning (Wessel-Powell, Buchholz, & Brownell, 2019). Taking the time to know children like Jonah, who enjoys graphic novels, loves soccer, comes from a bilingual family, and loves building with LEGOs, and affording students the freedom to inquire, explore, and create provides an impetus for this chapter and the work described. As Wessel-Powell, Buccholz, and Brownell (2019) contended, teachers can locate and expand on methods rooted in creativity and agency to engage children beyond the restrictive limitations of top-down policies.

In this chapter, the authors suggest that it is time for a shift toward student directed learning, considering the kaleidoscope of experiences of the modern child. While many of the behaviors and interests Jonah has exhibited in this brief vignette might not align with traditional curricular expectations, there is a wealth of possibilities in this child’s interest in play, linguistic repertoire, and visual representations of his learning and experiences. A traditional approach to these interests and avocations might be to ignore them in favor of deference to a policy; yet, there is so much more possibility in seizing on these cultural artifacts to create and sustain learning experiences that benefit both the student and the teacher.

While LEGOs have held a firm spot in children’s culture for almost fifty years (Herman, 2012) and graphic novels have become increasingly popular over the past decade (Kwon, 2020), we use both to connect to the modern child. The purpose of this chapter is to provide teachers with an example of how the modern students’ life can be utilized in classrooms. Specifically, LEGOs and graphic novels can be used creatively to engage children in STEM and digital storytelling. This chapter explores the use of graphic novels, or longer visual narratives, to serve as mentor texts for students in creating shorter image-based digital stories. The distinction is made between the short form comic strips that students produce and the mentor text graphic novels, which are typically considered to be longer narratives collected in a single volume (Baetens & Frey, 2014; Thompson, 2008).

The chapter opens with a section on the integration of STEM and literacy, followed by a description of how digital literacies and digital storytelling can be used in service of such integration. Particular attention is given to the visual medium of graphic novels as an approach for connecting these practices in the classroom. Finally, we demonstrate how StoryVisualizer by LEGO Education, an application for building LEGOs, taking photos, and creating stories with these images, can be employed to meet the goals of integration and digital storytelling and to connect academic learning to children’s world and daily cultural practices.