Note Card Confessions: Free at Last; A Story About Olaudah Equiano:
"Free at Last" is a note card confession story over Olaudah Equiano, an African American who was enslaved in 1755. I chose to do a note card confession story over Olaudah Equiano because slavery is a topic I could possibly be teaching over some day. I started working on this assignment by first researching about different people and topics that could potentially work. I knew I wanted a historical figure that went through a tragic experience. I searched personal stories from people who survived the Great Depression, Slavery, etc. Equiano's is the one story that I found most interesting. He had a very emotional experience to talk about so I thought that his story would be the perfect one for this assignment. I based my notecards off of Equiano's story on discoveringbristol.org. This website actually had some of his own exact words about his experience that I used on my note cards to make it seem more realistic. After reading the story over Equiano, I used a planning sheet that was provided for us on our class page. This allowed me to plan out exactly what I wanted to say on each card before actually writing them all out. Then, I wrote all my notecards out using a black marker on index cards. I practiced reading my cards out loud to make sure the story I was telling flowed nicely. I chose to hold my notecards in front of my stomach and kept them there while I recorded. Next, I chose the music for my video. I knew that I needed something kind of sad because, after all, Equiano's experience was NOT a good one as a slave! However, he did have a happy ending, even if he did have to buy himself out of slavery (FREEDOM!). I looked through YouTube to see what all my options were. After listening to a few different classical pieces, I chose "90 minutes of Sad Music You'll Never Forget." I really liked the way this music aided me in creating the emotional experience of my story. It really added to my video. Finally, it was time to record. I had my roommate help me record so that the notecards would be pretty close to centered on my video. She pressed play on my music before she started recording for me. I flipped through the card slow enough for viewers to read them. This project could be used in many ways in my classroom some day. Note card confessions can be used to help your students see multiple perspectives. It helps them really feel what that specific person is going through. It also is a fun activity to keep them engaged in, rather than just simply researching and writing the information down. Educators can use note card confessions as a way for your students to get to know each other on one of the first days or weeks of class. This could help your students connect with each other quickly. It could also be used to teach your students about different emotions and feelings. Another idea that educators could use this for is they could have their students learn more about their ancestors and then make a note card confession story to share about what they learned. Educators could also have their students learn about step-by-step processes/instructions and write out step-by-step instructions on how to make a note card confession story. This type of project could be used in almost any subject; Math, English, History, Science, etc. As you can see, there are countless ways to use note card confession stories in your classroom!