Project Overview
The goal of this assignment was to create a multimodal narrative. According to Fiveable Library, a multimodal narrative is “a storytelling approach that combines various modes of communication, such as text, images, audio, video, and interactive elements, to create a richer and more engaging experience for the audience.” Finding a subject that wasn’t overly complicated but also interesting proved a bit difficult and I felt creativity block for quite some time. Luckily I eventually realized that I wanted to do a timeline and immediately thought of Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Laura Ingalls Wilder was an incredibly important role-model to me growing up. I was raised in a very religious household where literature and media consumption were severely restricted. Little House on the Prairie was a series my mother never got mad at me for reading too many times (yes, she would get mad at me for reading too much) and I absolutely loved the stories. One year, my mom let me get the full book series in one of the Scholastic flyers that would go home periodically in elementary school. When I tell you I read those books over, and over, and over until the pages were falling off, I sincerely mean it. The book that was the most worn, and looking back I assume the most read, was On the Banks of Plum Creek. All of the books, but that one the most so, felt like a warm hug every time I would read them. There weren’t many things that made me feel that way growing up so I treasured them with my whole heart.
Laura taught me perseverance. She taught me strength. She taught me that being feisty or against the grain was okay. She showed me that you can do anything if you put your mind to it. These are the themes that stick out when I think back to reading the books. I didn’t, however, remember the racist undertones that exist between the pages of her books. While doing research for this project, I encountered articles referencing how the Wilder Medal was renamed due to major backlash about the racism within some of her books. I want to take this time to acknowledge that there are themes and descriptions that are absolutely not okay in the Little House on the Prairie series. While some want to ban her books or have those sections removed, I am in the camp that I believe lessons can be taught by not avoiding our country’s past but facing it head on. These books can create the space for a healthy discourse about racism and what we can do to combat it today. I hope that people are able to appreciate the art aside from the artist and the generation in which the artist lived. I am sure that we all desire for future generations to look upon our mistakes and actions with the same level of understanding.
This project proved to me why having a solid plan is essential prior to beginning. I attempted to start the website before doing my research or drawing anything in the beginning, mainly due to being amazed and inspired by Skrollr examples shown in class. Unfortunately, this caused me to go down a rabbit-hole and become quite overwhelmed after several unproductive hours went into the website, only for me to delete it all the next day. Eventually I found my rhythm once I completed my research and had a better understanding of what I wanted the skeleton of my site to look like. After I started gaining momentum, things fell into place relatively quickly after.
*Disclaimer*
This website was created with the assistance of AI tools, including ChatGPT, to help with coding, content structuring, and multimedia integration. The final design and content were reviewed and customized to reflect my personal ideas and insights.