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The structure and language of digital stories

Any story, digital or otherwise, needs to encompass certain elements to make it compelling or ‘worth’ being heard or watched.

Writing with clarity

Diagram of three arrows pointing downward labelled captivate, describe and analyse, and summarise. A clearly written story with a powerful narrative has a beginning, a middle and an end which work together to present a cohesive message.

Captivate your audience at the beginning by framing it with a question, issue, or controversial topic. Compel them to continue reading, listening or watching, and make them want to see how the problem is solved.
Describe and analyse the course of events in the middle: What happened? Why does it matter? And why should we care?
Summarise your conclusions at the end of the story: How was the situation resolved? What effect has that or could that cause? What is likely to or should happen next? The end of your story should also reveal or reiterate your viewpoint and give your audience a take-home message that gives them something to act on and/or think about.

To effectively communicate your story within this structure, it is essential to write clear sentences and paragraphs, with a defined message and logical signposting to guide your audience.

Writing creatively

A creatively written story communicates new ideas. Not all the information needs to be new, but there must be something unique about what is being presented, and/or the way it is presented. Even historical stories about well-known events communicate a new understanding of the event, its details, and its significance. Ask yourself what is unique about your story, and plan how you will draw attention to that in your writing.

Another outlet for creativity in digital storytelling is the media that you choose, the specific tools you will use to create your media, as well as how you will use them narratively. Once you have drafted the basic structure and content of your story, you can begin to plan how to tell it by selecting your media and tools. See the media and tools selection checklist below for a list of criteria to help you choose your media and tools.

Conveying importance and interest

A digital story may address a contentious topic of discussion, something newsworthy, such as a current phenomenon, a historical event, or a question that will be answered by the end of the story. The common point shared between these kinds of topics is that they are all worthwhile issues, which capture audience interest and maintain audience attention. In other words, they have intrinsic value which makes the writer want to tell the story, and the audience want to follow the story (when it is told well).

Follow these steps to craft and communicate the value of your chosen issue:

Ask yourself:
- What was it about the issue which captured your attention in the first place? This is often a good indicator of what will make it interesting to other people as well.
- Why does the issue matter? This will help you identify and communicate the significance of your issue.
- What effect does/might the issue have? This will help you identify and communicate the implications of your issue.
Together, the significance and the implications of the issue answer the question ‘so what?’ If your audience can get to the end of your story and still finds the need to ask ‘so what?’ you have not communicated the value of your issue, so you need to make sure you are actively answering this question.
During your drafting process, ask yourself how you are conveying your features of interest to your audience.
Make sure that you include an opening ‘hook’, ample evidence throughout your story, and a concluding take-home message.
A hook is a narrative device that grabs the audience’s attention and entices them to continue reading/watching. There are many ways of writing a hook. For example, you could use:
a bold declarative statement about the issue which the audience may agree or disagree with and therefore want to know more
a rhetorical question to incite the audience to think about the issue more deeply
a fact or statistic to pique the audience’s interest
a metaphor to make your audience think about the topic in a unique way
an emotional, anecdotal, or personal experience that connects the audience to the human aspect of an issue.
The only way to truly communicate the importance of an issue is to support your argument with compelling and reliable evidence. Ideally, you should use scholarly publications as the main source of your evidence. Additionally, when discussing current and real-world contexts, scholarly sources can be supplemented by references to grey literature such as government and industry reports, and statistical datasets.
A strong conclusion to a story has a clear take-home message which is more than just a summary of the main points. It also provides possible recommendations based on logical connections to the evidence presented throughout your story.
A carefully crafted take-home message will reinforce the implications of the issue by leaving your audience with:
a clear understanding of the significance of your issue by restating the most important factors
an idea of what can (or should be) done with the information you have presented.
During your editing stage, evaluate your own writing from your audience’s perspective as if it were written by someone else, and ask yourself whether your features of interest have been adequately communicated.
Reconsider your hook, evidence, and take home-message and ask yourself:
- Could the hook/evidence/take-home message be stronger, or more clearly written?
- Is the take-home message directly and logically related to the hook?
- Does the evidence fully support the take-home message? Are there any gaps that should be filled?

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Student Academic Success

Student Academic Success

The structure and language of digital stories

Writing with clarity

Writing creatively

Conveying importance and interest