Life Stories Seniors Enter Cyber World At Libby Center To Preserve Their Personal Histories
Lovums, Bernadine Van Thiel’s round-cheeked doll, appears in dozens of photographs from the early 1920s.
“Lovums was my favorite doll,” said Van Thiel, turning the pages of a photo album filled with sepia-colored images of herself, Lovums, and her father’s garden.
Van Thiel used a computer, software and a scanner to preserve images of what she describes “as a simpler time” on videotape.
Van Thiel is getting help with her project through a class being offered at the technology laboratory at Libby Center.
The class pairs senior citizens with computers to enable them to tell a portion of their life story using text and video.
The class, in its first offering, is the brainchild of Pauline Bresnahan, technology facilitator for Spokane School District 81.
“We’ve been looking for ways to share with the community,” Bresnahan said. “We thought seniors would be a wonderful group to work with.
“I thought this would be more fun than doing a computer class.”
Bresnahan and Tim Riordon, coordinator of technology training at Libby Center, went to the city’s senior centers last month to publicized the program, which began Aug. 18. The cost of the half-day, weeklong program is $40.
The class is limited to 12 to 15 students.
“We’re going to start small and see where it leads,” Riordon said.
“The end result will be a PowerPoint presentation,” Riordon said. “It’s a very easy program to use.”
PowerPoint is a software program that allows users to scan their own pictures and slides, or pull images from the Internet to create a visual and textual presentation.
During the first class, participants were asked to write their story.
Bob Smick’s story focused on his older brother.
“My story is about his life, with emphasis on his service in the Navy during World War II,” Smick said.
On the second day, seniors were asked to illustrate the text with photographs, birth certificates and documents that could be scanned into the computer.
Bresnahan was assisted by Sherri Benson, an art teacher at Ferris High School. Benson helped students design a pleasing presentation. The finished product can be produced as either a booklet or a video with narration.
For Van Thiel, the class allowed her to preserve a part of her childhood for her children and grandchildren.
“I believe that my experience growing up is part of a culture that has become extinct,” Van Thiel said. “The simple days I grew up in held a beauty we don’t see today.”
For 87-year-old Dorothy B. Reed, Monday’s class experience was the first time she had touched a computer.
Reed has been researching her family’s genealogy since 1975. For Reed, the class is an opportunity to record her life story for her grandchildren and great grandchildren.
“I’ve had a blessed life,” she said.
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