11.5: Thing #2 - Image Generators

Wordle or Wordsift

I love Wordle. I just showed it to teachers in GT training on June 11th. There are so many terrific applications! For example, I created a Wordle from the text of the first chapter of No More Dead Dogs. I explained how the size of words in a word cloud are based on the frequency of words appearing in the text. Then I asked them to predict what the book was about. It was a great intro to the book. See:

Next, I put two Wordles side by side. The text comes from Dr. Bertie Kingore's article, "High Achiever, Gifted Learner, Creative Thinker." I took the list of characteristics of high achievers and created a Wordle, then did the same for gifted. I put the Wordles side by side and asked them to identify which was which and why. Great thinking!

Since I already know and love Wordle, I decided to try out Wordsift. Here's the Wordsift for gifted learners from Dr. Kingore's article.

As a visual person, I like Wordle much better. However, the links are interesting. I see it being helpful for vocabulary purposes, in particular.

Glogster or VoiceThread

I couldn't get the Glogster/edu tutorial to play. I may need to be out of the district to get it. Maybe seeing the tutorial would make me a fan. I've spent 45 minutes working on a Glog and got a title and 2 pictures loaded into it. Too much time! I think the idea is awesome. Some of the student examples were great, too. I like it better than Trading Cards.

When you do a physical poster, you have to think through the content, then plan the layout, maybe look for images to paste on or determine images to draw. You have to do all of those things for a Glog, but there are more steps involved: choosing the right background and graphics, determine the right keywords for a product image search, finding appropriate websites to link - or tacking them during your research. I can see parents getting irritated at the time it takes to do a Glog versus a regular poster. I'd make this a choice rather than a required product.

VoiceThread is neat! I looked around and found this great retelling of the Three Little Pigs. I love the commenting. Getting kids an authentic audience is difficult. This makes it easy in a somewhat protected environment. It's a great venue for research reports or original stories. It's also a great place to post questions kids have about something to collect opinions. I tried creating one, but got stuck. My current computer doesn't have a microphone, and then I had trouble adding text comments. I will definitely play with this one more, though!

Animoto or Voki

I'm already a fan of Animoto. I've posted several in the past. (See Great Books for Young Readers, Great Books for Older Readers, and my fabulous toddler.)

Voki is fun! I think folks would get a kick out of it at first. You'd have to change up the message or make sure the Voki spoke the message in an email for it to maintain it's interest.

Bookr

Well here it is... hours later!

The examples in the archive were great. Good for a poem or short summary of information. Took forever, hard to find good pics - not one of my favorite activities.