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Mediascape Stories
To view stories and projects created by Listening to the River participants, click a project area on the map below. Click here to find out more about how these stories were made.
Go to the Publishing and Presenting section in the Community Guide for complete details on:
- How to publish your finished media pieces
- Where to publish media
- Putting the media within a watershed context
Publishing and Presenting the Watershed Story
Part of the motivation and interest for many teens participating in LTTR activities is producing something concrete in the form of a finished piece of audio or video. In a sense, much of the final work of the watershed discovery program is geared toward finalizing that piece, so that participants "have something to show" for their effort. If crafted correctly, many of the pieces explicitly serve to educate the listener/viewer about some aspect of the watershed.
We've accomplished this in several ways: the LTTR web site's MediaScape, broadcast on public radio programs and via displays in exhibits.
The MediaScape
One of the organizing principles of the Listening to the River project is the idea of a map. Maps are used early in the process to explain the concept of a watershed, show participants watershed boundaries, and to prepare participants for excursions into the watershed, so that during their field activities they are prepared with a geographic framework of the watersheds.
After each LTTR excursion, the collected photo, audio or video clips are geo-referenced for later uploading onto the watershed map - The MediaScape. In this way, watershed experiences and discoveries are shown with geographic context, providing a richer experience for both listeners and viewers.
The Listening to the River web site will host the MediaScape indefinitely. New projects covering new watersheds will receive their own space on the web site
Exhibits or Kiosks
Another way for LTTR participants to publish or present their watershed story is in an exhibit or kiosk. This can take on many forms. The simplest is a standalone desktop or laptop computer loaded with the finished media pieces.
Our Story - The Mini Exhibit
The LTTR project in the Grand Traverse region developed a mini exhibit where local youth showcased the video, pictures or audio they collected. The mini-exhibit was a mobile display, complete with a laptop for showing the MediaScape content as well as a silhouette figure of a boy with a parabolic microphone which, when aimed at different locations, showed different videos. The project website offers photos of the mini exhibit and the full exhibit at the Great Lakes Children's Museum.
The specific form is less important than the intent of a kiosk or mini exhibit, which is to stand in a public place and showcase information and stories about the local watershed collected by youth.