Instead of a face-to-face class, we had an online midterm course reflection assignment in which students were asked to answer the following questions for each week of the seven weeks we have had in the course thus far:
1. What did I learn?
2. What did I do?
3. How did I feel about what I learned and what I did?
Students had a lot of Web 2.0 tools to choose from. They could do a blog, a loggel, a series of 7 vokis, a moviemaker video, a toondoo, a Photostory 3 digital story, or use jing.com to capture their stories.
Most students chose to do vokis and blogs. I had outstanding submissions from the majority of the students. I would like to showcase a few here and on the sidebar as loggel won't let you embed.
Here is Tom's Toondoo.
Tim and Rolando did an awesome job on their loggels. For those of you who don't know what a loggel is it's like diary entries on a timeline. They are often used for travel logs. I thought that loggels would be a great way to capture our journeys as writers. I haven't experimented with this Web 2.0 tool which allows people to comment on your entries. You can embed videos and photos in addition to text. The only disadvantage to loggels is not being able to embed the code into a blog. Here are the links.
Tim's loggel: http://www.loggel.com/lifelogs/timilne/Diary--Midterm-Reflection/1373
Rolando's loggel:http://www.loggel.com/lifelogs/rlopez/Diary--Midterm-Assignment/1378
The voki submissions were also good. Ryan's series of vokis were very creative. He not only chose different characters but he used different voices. He did his Borat voki for Week 2 of the course.
One student took the time (from noon to 5 p.m.) to make a moviemaker clip. I asked him to submit it to YouTube so that he can get an embed code and I can add it here on my blog.
The one thing I would structure more on this midterm reflection is have the students tie the midterm objectives more directly to their discussion. I felt that a lot of the students talked about the readings and didn't connect the objective of the lesson to the discussion. Some made the connections between the essays using the constructive approach, but most just talked about the readings and how they felt about the readings. Even though the midterm objective document was in the lesson folder, I have a feeling that most students didn't look at it when they did their course reflections.
I need to work on this more, particularly in the online portion of the class. I need to constantly remind them to make those connections to the concepts.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Week 6: Day Two
Students are turning in their Paper 2 Drafts today and are playing around with some Web 2.0 tools to decide what they will be doing for their midterm course reflection.
The majority of the students chose to do the loggel but I'm pretty sure they didn't understand what it entailed. They thought it would involve simple text diary entries. I had had it on my original list of tools to use and removed it.
Nine students chose to do a loggel. Five will do vokis. Two chose to do blogs and one will do a movie.
No one chose Photostory or jing.
Check out this link about loggel. It is usually used for travel logs but metaphorically speaking their writing journey from Week 1 to Week 7 is going to be captured using text and the visual elements.
http://www.loggel.com/
Loggel can be accurately defined as a Lifelog community with a new format and the best part of it is that you will not have to pay anything at all to join it. This site is a great mixture of aesthetics and usefulness that gives you the chance to make use of modern web technologies in a very simple way. If you decide to use this solution you will be benefited with an interesting service that was especially created to allow you to record a diversity of life situations in multiple media resources.
Do you want to get in touch with friends as well as to be allowed to meet new people? If you do, this site will be giving you the chance to add texts and a variety of images, as well as audio files and a number of videos to your profile. This is a convenient service you can use in order to let the world know about the last big party or wedding you have attended, etc.
No matter if you want to publish your profile and your Lifelogs, or if you prefer to keep everything private, this is going to be the right site for you to have access to such an option.
Read more: http://www.killerstartups.com/Social-Networking/loggel-com-a-new-community-experience#ixzz0fvfXBZAH
The majority of the students chose to do the loggel but I'm pretty sure they didn't understand what it entailed. They thought it would involve simple text diary entries. I had had it on my original list of tools to use and removed it.
Nine students chose to do a loggel. Five will do vokis. Two chose to do blogs and one will do a movie.
No one chose Photostory or jing.
Check out this link about loggel. It is usually used for travel logs but metaphorically speaking their writing journey from Week 1 to Week 7 is going to be captured using text and the visual elements.
http://www.loggel.com/
Loggel can be accurately defined as a Lifelog community with a new format and the best part of it is that you will not have to pay anything at all to join it. This site is a great mixture of aesthetics and usefulness that gives you the chance to make use of modern web technologies in a very simple way. If you decide to use this solution you will be benefited with an interesting service that was especially created to allow you to record a diversity of life situations in multiple media resources.
Do you want to get in touch with friends as well as to be allowed to meet new people? If you do, this site will be giving you the chance to add texts and a variety of images, as well as audio files and a number of videos to your profile. This is a convenient service you can use in order to let the world know about the last big party or wedding you have attended, etc.
No matter if you want to publish your profile and your Lifelogs, or if you prefer to keep everything private, this is going to be the right site for you to have access to such an option.
Read more: http://www.killerstartups.com/Social-Networking/loggel-com-a-new-community-experience#ixzz0fvfXBZAH
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Week 6: Day One
Today's lesson was on the media's influence on a woman's and a man's image. The lesson began with a journal entry related to the media's influence on a woman's image.
We connected the video to the essay by Dave Barry called Beauty and the Beast.
Then, students were given the following activity.
Work in pairs on this activity. One person is responsible for the text portion; the other is the PowerPoint person.
Click on the link here which explains men and masculinity: http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/issues/stereotyping/men_and_masculinity/index.cfm
Scan the information that applies to how the media influences society's perceptions on what it means to be a male in America.
Then put together a slide show using photos and text which explain the media's influence on the American male image.
You should have a title slide with the title Men and Masculinity with your names and a graphic on that slide.
Attach your Powerpoint slide show to your post and include both names in your subject heading. One person will be responsible for the text while the other is responsible for finding the graphics that represent the text.
Three pairs came up and presented their slideshows. Tim and Reggie put the best one together.
I thought the pairs worked very well together and worked very efficiently once they figured out that the resource was provided in the discussion forum. The timing for the activity was just right. If I did this again, I would have a couple of oral presentations and then I would have students go back in the discussion forum and do sandwich critiques of two other presentations.
I would also include in the directions that the title slide had to be a POW and the final slide had to be a WOW in which the information presented was synthesized. I pointed out that the visual representation of the definition of masculinity needed to have the elements of a text essay. In other words, it needed the POW factor, the development of the thesis, and the WOW factor. When one pair was finished early, I suggested that they go back and do that final slide synthesizing what they had presented.
Here is Reggie and Tim's powerpoint presentation they created.
We connected the video to the essay by Dave Barry called Beauty and the Beast.
Then, students were given the following activity.
Work in pairs on this activity. One person is responsible for the text portion; the other is the PowerPoint person.
Click on the link here which explains men and masculinity: http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/issues/stereotyping/men_and_masculinity/index.cfm
Scan the information that applies to how the media influences society's perceptions on what it means to be a male in America.
Then put together a slide show using photos and text which explain the media's influence on the American male image.
You should have a title slide with the title Men and Masculinity with your names and a graphic on that slide.
Attach your Powerpoint slide show to your post and include both names in your subject heading. One person will be responsible for the text while the other is responsible for finding the graphics that represent the text.
Three pairs came up and presented their slideshows. Tim and Reggie put the best one together.
I thought the pairs worked very well together and worked very efficiently once they figured out that the resource was provided in the discussion forum. The timing for the activity was just right. If I did this again, I would have a couple of oral presentations and then I would have students go back in the discussion forum and do sandwich critiques of two other presentations.
I would also include in the directions that the title slide had to be a POW and the final slide had to be a WOW in which the information presented was synthesized. I pointed out that the visual representation of the definition of masculinity needed to have the elements of a text essay. In other words, it needed the POW factor, the development of the thesis, and the WOW factor. When one pair was finished early, I suggested that they go back and do that final slide synthesizing what they had presented.
Here is Reggie and Tim's powerpoint presentation they created.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Week 5: Day Two
Wednesday's online discussion forum's theme was the environment. The directions were as follows.
Make sure you read Carson's A Fable for Tomorrow (359-362), Helvarg's The Storm This Time (103-110), and Harris' How to Keep Air Clean (Week 5 Lesson folder).
Watch the YouTube video below on air pollution.
Answer 3 of the 5 questions below. Be sure and remember to reply to at least two of your peers.
1. Relate Joni Mitchell's, Big Yellow Taxi to the Carson essay.
2. Find a video on YouTube that mirrors the story that Helvarg tells in his essay, The Storm This Time. Compare and contrast the video you chose with the information in the essay. You can either provide the link to the video or embed the code using the last icon on the toolbar that looks like a piece of paper with a yellow arrow in the corner (the Source icon). The embed code is next to the YouTube video under the url code. You must hit the Source icon before you paste the code in the message box.
3. Helvarg took the photographs that accompany the essay. Compare the photograph of the marked door on Page 105 with the author's description of it in Paragraph 6. Does this photograph add to the description in the essay, or is the author's description so vivid that the photograph is unnecessary? Explain. Now it is your turn to find a Katrina photograph and describe it in words. Be sure and insert the image and cite it according to MLA guidelines. Write your description below the photograph.
4.Sydney Harris never once mentions what we can do as individuals to keep the air clean. Imagine you are going to write an essay on this subject. Find at least two other credible sources on the internet on what individuals can do to keep the air clean. Be sure and cite your sources using appropriate MLA format.
5. Carson imagines a fictional town that has changed for the worse. Consider a place you know well that has changed for the better. You might focus on a renovated school, a rehabilitated neighborhood, a newly preserved park, etc. Contrast the place before and after the change. Describe the effects of the change.
Jared did an outstanding job on his post and replies to his peers.
by Jared at 2/10/2010 8:52 PM
1.Big Yellow Taxi basically explains Carson essay, except in more poetic way. Mitchell’s songs talks about man’s desires over personal items, a materialistic society. That we as a society never think of the consequences, we leap and never look back. The songs message correlates at the end of Carson’s essay. When the town gets hit by a famine and everything starts to die. Man can do nothing to stop it, because the actions previously taken can’t be reverse. I believe I have a good grasp of the message of both the article and the song. If you don’t take the time to appreciate the natural world, everything will be lost. The world of the future will be become gray, with no shades of colors to go along with it. Just like in the song maybe one day we will have to visit a tree museum, just to see a tree.
2.I found a video clip called Hurricane Katrina Images, it show the devastation after the hurricane hit. In the video clips it shows many images including, national guards, the army, and rationed food supplies. Helvary while visiting Katrina describes seeing national guards, keeping the peace and creating road blocks. Just like images of destroyed homes, Helvarg recalls visiting a man’s house that has been completely destroyed. Helvarg talks about organizations trying to give food to people in the city, just like the images portrayed people giving out food. However there are some differences between the video clip and Helvarg’s article. While reading his article he correlates a lot of what he sees to past experiences. For instance he references a lot about New Orleans destruction similar to when was a war correspondent, and the damage he saw in those countries. Helvarg also is more interested about the environmental damage of New Orleans, as opposed to the physical destruction the video clip shows. The video clip showed more of a general consensus of people’s emotion about Katrina, as to Helvarg’s perception of what he saw there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E971oBiu9Z4
4.I believe the steps of keeping our air clean is through personal responsibility. While reading the article I noticed the main pollutant was fossil fuels, or the most expressed. Right now we are two heavily dependant on fossil fuels to stop cold turkey. Though what we can do is lower the amount fuel we need per year. For instance people should drive cars only for pure necessity. Perhaps maybe there should be a federal mandate, that homes of certain sizes should have solar panels. Maybe we a need a policy implemented by the federal government to have 35% of renewable sources by 2025. There are many different solutions to solve this, but by combining them we could change the future. So by lowering our demands for fossil fuels, we lower the amount of pollutants put into the atmosphere.
Tips to improve your Gas Mileage." Fuel Economy. Web. 11 Feb. 2010..
"50 Tips To Prevent Air Pollution - Home And Garden News Story - KIRO Seattle." Seattle News, Weather, Traffic, Video and Sports I Pacific Northwest News I KIRO 7 Seattle, Washington. Web. 11 Feb. 2010..
Re: Mckenzee Discussion Forum 4
by Jared at 2/10/2010 8:59 PM
I thought how you described the yellow taxi to Carson's essay was excellent. You brought out points I never even thought of saying. I have no other comments to make, keep up the good work.
Re: Discussion Forum 4
by Jared at 2/10/2010 9:06 PM
I like the points you brought out about yellow taxi baby, and Carson's essay. Also the story of Disney's re-renovation. However you lacked in both answers your initial P.O.W, in grabbing your audience and making your claim.
Make sure you read Carson's A Fable for Tomorrow (359-362), Helvarg's The Storm This Time (103-110), and Harris' How to Keep Air Clean (Week 5 Lesson folder).
Watch the YouTube video below on air pollution.
Answer 3 of the 5 questions below. Be sure and remember to reply to at least two of your peers.
1. Relate Joni Mitchell's, Big Yellow Taxi to the Carson essay.
2. Find a video on YouTube that mirrors the story that Helvarg tells in his essay, The Storm This Time. Compare and contrast the video you chose with the information in the essay. You can either provide the link to the video or embed the code using the last icon on the toolbar that looks like a piece of paper with a yellow arrow in the corner (the Source icon). The embed code is next to the YouTube video under the url code. You must hit the Source icon before you paste the code in the message box.
3. Helvarg took the photographs that accompany the essay. Compare the photograph of the marked door on Page 105 with the author's description of it in Paragraph 6. Does this photograph add to the description in the essay, or is the author's description so vivid that the photograph is unnecessary? Explain. Now it is your turn to find a Katrina photograph and describe it in words. Be sure and insert the image and cite it according to MLA guidelines. Write your description below the photograph.
4.Sydney Harris never once mentions what we can do as individuals to keep the air clean. Imagine you are going to write an essay on this subject. Find at least two other credible sources on the internet on what individuals can do to keep the air clean. Be sure and cite your sources using appropriate MLA format.
5. Carson imagines a fictional town that has changed for the worse. Consider a place you know well that has changed for the better. You might focus on a renovated school, a rehabilitated neighborhood, a newly preserved park, etc. Contrast the place before and after the change. Describe the effects of the change.
Jared did an outstanding job on his post and replies to his peers.
Discussion Forum 4 Post
by Jared at 2/10/2010 8:52 PM
1.Big Yellow Taxi basically explains Carson essay, except in more poetic way. Mitchell’s songs talks about man’s desires over personal items, a materialistic society. That we as a society never think of the consequences, we leap and never look back. The songs message correlates at the end of Carson’s essay. When the town gets hit by a famine and everything starts to die. Man can do nothing to stop it, because the actions previously taken can’t be reverse. I believe I have a good grasp of the message of both the article and the song. If you don’t take the time to appreciate the natural world, everything will be lost. The world of the future will be become gray, with no shades of colors to go along with it. Just like in the song maybe one day we will have to visit a tree museum, just to see a tree.
2.I found a video clip called Hurricane Katrina Images, it show the devastation after the hurricane hit. In the video clips it shows many images including, national guards, the army, and rationed food supplies. Helvary while visiting Katrina describes seeing national guards, keeping the peace and creating road blocks. Just like images of destroyed homes, Helvarg recalls visiting a man’s house that has been completely destroyed. Helvarg talks about organizations trying to give food to people in the city, just like the images portrayed people giving out food. However there are some differences between the video clip and Helvarg’s article. While reading his article he correlates a lot of what he sees to past experiences. For instance he references a lot about New Orleans destruction similar to when was a war correspondent, and the damage he saw in those countries. Helvarg also is more interested about the environmental damage of New Orleans, as opposed to the physical destruction the video clip shows. The video clip showed more of a general consensus of people’s emotion about Katrina, as to Helvarg’s perception of what he saw there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E971oBiu9Z4
4.I believe the steps of keeping our air clean is through personal responsibility. While reading the article I noticed the main pollutant was fossil fuels, or the most expressed. Right now we are two heavily dependant on fossil fuels to stop cold turkey. Though what we can do is lower the amount fuel we need per year. For instance people should drive cars only for pure necessity. Perhaps maybe there should be a federal mandate, that homes of certain sizes should have solar panels. Maybe we a need a policy implemented by the federal government to have 35% of renewable sources by 2025. There are many different solutions to solve this, but by combining them we could change the future. So by lowering our demands for fossil fuels, we lower the amount of pollutants put into the atmosphere.
Tips to improve your Gas Mileage." Fuel Economy. Web. 11 Feb. 2010.
"50 Tips To Prevent Air Pollution - Home And Garden News Story - KIRO Seattle." Seattle News, Weather, Traffic, Video and Sports I Pacific Northwest News I KIRO 7 Seattle, Washington. Web. 11 Feb. 2010.
Re: Mckenzee Discussion Forum 4
by Jared at 2/10/2010 8:59 PM
I thought how you described the yellow taxi to Carson's essay was excellent. You brought out points I never even thought of saying. I have no other comments to make, keep up the good work.
Re: Discussion Forum 4
by Jared at 2/10/2010 9:06 PM
I like the points you brought out about yellow taxi baby, and Carson's essay. Also the story of Disney's re-renovation. However you lacked in both answers your initial P.O.W, in grabbing your audience and making your claim.
Week 5: Day One
The focus of our Monday class was on two constructive arguments that were presented in two essays. The essays were on the subject of torture: Alter's Time to Think About Torture and Porter's Now the Talk is About Bringing Back Torture
I decided to poll the students with a question related to how far would you go to extract information from a suspected terrorist if there was a possibility of saving American lives.
Here is the poll and the results which showed that 50% of the students would resort to waterboarding. I even had one of the students describe what waterboarding is. I then explained to the students that if I were presenting my case against using any form of torture, including waterboarding, I would have to provide evidence that waterboarding and other methods aren't effective in extracting the truth. Here is the poll. It is live so you can text in your response.
We then did a journal entry on an interrogation of a 10-year-old boy who was pressured into confessing to a crime he didn't commit. It brought home the point that these kinds of methods often lead to false confessions.
Check out the video.
We then moved into a group exercise in which students had to answer questions on the two assigned readings: Alter's Time to Think About Torture and Porter's Now the Talk is About Bringing Back Torture
I was not pleased with this groupwork activity where I assigned a writer, a resource person, a presenter, and an observer. Everyone was taking out their books when it was the resourcer's job to be in charge. There was little talking and from what the observers said on their sheets, the talking that did go on was chitchat about stuff not related to the assigned task. I think the biggest problem was that the students were not sitting face to face looking at one another. If I did this activity again, I would have printed out the task and made the students face one another to do the task. One student mentioned that the task was "boring." It probably didn't challenge the students because everyone identified the thesis, came up with a decent definition of torture in the context of Alter and Porter's essays, and came up with a list of ways that they feel tortured.
Based on the results of the poll, I think that next time I will have the students debate using extreme measures like waterboarding to extract information. Since 50% of the class said they would do it, I would divide the class into groups of 4 (pro and con) and work on their case and then have a few present.
I decided to poll the students with a question related to how far would you go to extract information from a suspected terrorist if there was a possibility of saving American lives.
Here is the poll and the results which showed that 50% of the students would resort to waterboarding. I even had one of the students describe what waterboarding is. I then explained to the students that if I were presenting my case against using any form of torture, including waterboarding, I would have to provide evidence that waterboarding and other methods aren't effective in extracting the truth. Here is the poll. It is live so you can text in your response.
Get a free sms student response system at Poll Everywhere
We then did a journal entry on an interrogation of a 10-year-old boy who was pressured into confessing to a crime he didn't commit. It brought home the point that these kinds of methods often lead to false confessions.
Check out the video.
We then moved into a group exercise in which students had to answer questions on the two assigned readings: Alter's Time to Think About Torture and Porter's Now the Talk is About Bringing Back Torture
I was not pleased with this groupwork activity where I assigned a writer, a resource person, a presenter, and an observer. Everyone was taking out their books when it was the resourcer's job to be in charge. There was little talking and from what the observers said on their sheets, the talking that did go on was chitchat about stuff not related to the assigned task. I think the biggest problem was that the students were not sitting face to face looking at one another. If I did this activity again, I would have printed out the task and made the students face one another to do the task. One student mentioned that the task was "boring." It probably didn't challenge the students because everyone identified the thesis, came up with a decent definition of torture in the context of Alter and Porter's essays, and came up with a list of ways that they feel tortured.
Based on the results of the poll, I think that next time I will have the students debate using extreme measures like waterboarding to extract information. Since 50% of the class said they would do it, I would divide the class into groups of 4 (pro and con) and work on their case and then have a few present.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Week Four Day 2
The video above is a 30-second summary of the George Orwell story Shooting an Elephant.
The online assignment was a discussion forum. The directions are below.
Read and annotate Orwell's Shooting an Elephant (pp. 148 - 155). Choose ONE of the following to respond to and reply to at least two of your peers. Your post and replies should be submitted by 11:55 p.m. on Wednesday, February 3. Review the discussion forum rubric in the COURSE DOCUMENTS folder before posting your answer.
This assignment is worth 25 points.
1. In Paragraph 3, Orwell says that the elephant incident gave him a better understanding of "the real motives for which despotic governments act." What do you think he means? before you answer, reread Paragraph 7 carefully.
2. Was Orwell justified in shooting the elephant? Argue that Orwell was justified or not justified and support your claim with your reasons. Here are some points you might consider: the legality of Orwell's act, the elephant's temperment, the crowd's presence, the aftermath of the elephant's death, the death itself.
3. Orwell's essay concerns, in part, the tendency to conceal indecision and confusion behind a facade of authority. Focusing on one or two groups of people (parents, teachers, doctors, politicians, etc) argue that people in authority sometimes pretend to know what they're doing so that subordinates won't suspect their insecurity or incompetence. Part of your argument should focus on the consequences of such behavior.
Most students chose to answer the second question about whether the narrator was justified in shooting the elephant or not.
Valeria did an outstanding job responding to the 2nd question and replying to her peers.
Discussion Forum 3 by Valeria Alarcon (vaalarco) at 2/3/2010 9:40 PM
2. Was Orwell justified in shooting the elephant? Argue that Orwell was justified or not justified and support your claim with your reasons. Here are some points you might consider: the legality of Orwell's act, the elephant's temperment, the crowd's presence, the aftermath of the elephant's death, the death itself.
-In my opinion, Orwell was definitely not justified in shooting the poor elephant. Legally it is easy for one to understand his doing, because the government made it clear that it would be legal to kill an elephant if it has gone mad and it's owner isn't there to control it. Stating this, I truly feel that if Orwell was on his own and without the huge excited crowd, he would have not shot the elephant and would have waited for the owner to return, which is what he should have done. The elephant did go mad when he was destroying a lot of things in the town, but once Orwell got to the elephant, the elephant seemed calmed down and harmless. Therefore, since the elephant wasn't going mad anymore, there was no need to shoot the elephant. They could have gotten someone to get a tranquilizer and inject the elephant with it. The crowd's presence was what forced Orwell to shoot it, but he should have just walked away to not hear all the riot. He would have not felt guilty after the elephant's death. When he found out that it took the elephant thirty minutes to die and all the Burbans were eating his flesh, he began to feel extremely guilty and bad about himself. Yes, the elephant did things to destroy the town, but they should have not shot it. It was beginning to calm down and seem harmless. Therefore, it was wrong for him to shoot him, because he was the one harming the elephant when he could have been in peace and in control once his owner came to get him.
Re: Discussion Forum 4
by Valeria Alarcon at 2/3/2010 10:11 PM
You are right about how he did not have the good reasons to kill the elephant. If he didn't think it was necessary and he felt that it was calming down and being harmless, then there was no reason to shoot it. But, I do not agree that it should have been killed at all. I understand that it destroyed many things and killed an innocent person, but what the right thing they could have done was to inject it with a tranquilizer. Overall, you've made good statements about your opinion.
Re: Ben Brokaw Discussion Forum 3
by Valeria Alarcon at 2/3/2010 10:46 PM
Ben, I don't think you wrote enough to argue about your opinion. The only thing I can agree with you about is that owner should have taken better care of it. He should have tried calling up a friend or family member to help save his elephant though I strongly disagree that it was a correct action at all to kill the elephant. The animal was probably nervous and frightened with everything he saw going on and did not know what to do. Killing is never a right thing to do. They should have injected it with a tranquilizer and left it until it's owner came to control him. You should have written a little more to convince me more. Even though I did not agree with you, you did do a good job in defending him.
Most of the students are catching on to the sandwich critique for evaluating their peers' arguments. I am very please with the progress my Creative Composers are making in learning to make that transition from snorklers of their reading and writing world to scuba divers. Go Creative Composers.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Week Four Day 1
The day began with a journal entry based on the reading by Stephen Chapman's Prisoner's Dilemma. I showed the video clip called "America's Hardest Prisons."
http://www.wordle.net/
Students were introduced to Wordles and were given the directions below. I explained how important it is for writers to define what they are talking about before getting to the whys and hows.
Using the two readings which deal with the idea of what it means to be a civilized society, students worked in pairs. Three of the groups presented their Wordles and explained why they chose the words they used, why the colors, and why the layout and font.
I told them that Wordles are good marketing tools for advertising a product. When the presenters came up to the front of the class to present their case, we were the marketing team that would be choosing one proposal in our awareness campaign for becoming a more civilized America.
Although Clay and Carly did not present, I felt they did the best job in capturing the definition of what constitutes a civilized society.
If I were to change this activity, I would have the students include their written paragraph and include a short justification for their word choices, their layout, their fonts and colors.
I also would have had a polleverywhere to have students vote on the best of the three that were presented. All in all, it was a good lesson that was timed well.
DIRECTIONS: Work in pairs to create a Wordle about what constitutes a civilized society. In order for the phrase “civilized society” to appear as the biggest word, you will need to mention it at least 3 times in your paragraph.
As you discuss the content of your paragraph with your partner, keep in mind the content of the two readings.
Your first sentence should start with the sentence, “A civilized society is one that …….”
Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends, and even embed them in a discussion forum.
http://www.wordle.net/
Students were introduced to Wordles and were given the directions below. I explained how important it is for writers to define what they are talking about before getting to the whys and hows.
Using the two readings which deal with the idea of what it means to be a civilized society, students worked in pairs. Three of the groups presented their Wordles and explained why they chose the words they used, why the colors, and why the layout and font.
I told them that Wordles are good marketing tools for advertising a product. When the presenters came up to the front of the class to present their case, we were the marketing team that would be choosing one proposal in our awareness campaign for becoming a more civilized America.
Although Clay and Carly did not present, I felt they did the best job in capturing the definition of what constitutes a civilized society.
If I were to change this activity, I would have the students include their written paragraph and include a short justification for their word choices, their layout, their fonts and colors.
I also would have had a polleverywhere to have students vote on the best of the three that were presented. All in all, it was a good lesson that was timed well.
DIRECTIONS: Work in pairs to create a Wordle about what constitutes a civilized society. In order for the phrase “civilized society” to appear as the biggest word, you will need to mention it at least 3 times in your paragraph.
As you discuss the content of your paragraph with your partner, keep in mind the content of the two readings.
Your first sentence should start with the sentence, “A civilized society is one that …….”
Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends, and even embed them in a discussion forum.
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