Over the past couple of days there was a lot of concern about the web cloud site Wordle. The buzz was that they were in legal trouble and had to close down their site. Well, since that time it seems that they have worked out their issue and are back up and running in all of their glory. With all of the discussion about Wordle it got me thinking about lessons I have done with word clouds and decided to post one of my lesson ideas.
At the beginning of the year teachers always want to ge to know their students. Many of us want to start incorporating technology as soon as possible to are students as well. Well, this lesson idea fits both bills and is a great way to begin a new semester or year. First students write a brief biography about themselves. Once they have written this biography they paste it into Wordle or other web cloud generator and create a word cloud. Then they take this word cloud and put it into Edu.Glogster and create a Glog about the top five words in their biography. Their Glog will have the word cloud centered on the Glog. Then students will take the top five words in their word cloud and explain why they are the most important with images or text. Once they have created the Glog we then share them in class. This is a great way to know your students and for the students it can be an eye opening experience. Resources for this lesson idea are below.
Word Cloud site Resources:
- http://www.abcya.com/word_clouds.htm
- http://tagul.com/
- http://tagcrowd.com/
- http://worditout.com/
- http://www.imagechef.com/ic/word_mosaic/
- http://wordsift.com/
- http://www.wordle.net/
Link to Glogster
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Filed under: My Lessons | Tagged: Add new tag, classroom ideas, classroom projects, Dictionaries, education, Educational Technology, Educators, Glogster, how to, interactive, lesson plans, online environment, online resources teachers, Tag cloud, teaching, technology, technology in classroom, Vocabulary Lists, webtools, Wordle |
Eduhowto 
I’m not sure why but this weblog is loading extremely slow for me. Is anyone else having this problem or is it a issue on my end? I’ll check
back later and see if the problem still exists.
Check and it seems to be loading fine for me. Let me know if u find out something else.
It’s actually a cool and helpful piece of info. I am satisfied that you shared this useful info with us. Please stay us up to date like this. Thank you for sharing.
[…] Wordle + Glogster Lesson Plan – Combine these two for a real eye-opener. […]
Mr. EduHowTo,
I just stumbled upon this post, as I have an assignment for grad. school to find a educational blog to follow and respond to.
I have never heard of the Glogster concept before. What a great idea! I think students would really enjoy expressing themselves in this creative way. Your idea of having students create a Glog at the beginning of the year would be an effective way for the students and teacher to begin to build relationships by learning about each other’s interests and backgrounds.
I will definitely incorporate Glogs into my teaching. Thanks for the idea!
Is your grad school having you follow blogs as a way to develop your own PLN (Professional Learning Network)?
Yes. I am getting my Master’s in Integrating Technology in the Classroom, so your blog is a perfect fit!
I got mine about a year ago but still learning.
Thanks for the correction I had meant to say edu.glogster.com. That is a very important distinction thanks I will correct my post. Thanks again.
The majority of our educators are using edu.glogster.com and not Glogster.com. The content on our EDU site is much more school appropriate and there are features not available on Glogster. Check it out!
Jim Dachos
Education Manager
Glogster