Sunday, November 30, 2008

Wordle!


How cool does this look? I found this great Web 2.0 tool called Wordle, which allows you to create "clouds" similar to the ones found on del.icio.us. You can type in a bunch of words, which then randomizes the words into a cloud. There are many options/colors/fonts to choose from so you won't be disappointed. I learned the teaching strategy of 'wordsplash' back in my student teaching days, and this is a great tech remake of that. Wordsplash is an activity where you can preassess the students' prior knowledge of a particular topic. I usually put a poster on the wall/closet door and have kids write whatever word comes into mind when they look at the word on the poster (ex: Light, American Revolution, Spiders, Election...etc). This is a great way to understand what knowledge the kids are coming into the unit with. I plan to use this now as a new way of showing off my tech skills! :-)