Playing with literacy - using the fourth r

One of the greatest strengths, I think, of using Web 2.0 technologies in teaching is that there are so many great ways to link words and images together to make meaning. Many students at my school really struggle with writing and reading, and these tools provide a stimulating way of students creating (and internalising) their own learning.

I played round today with two tools from pimpampum - bubblr and phrasr.

The first atomic models

Scientific models

I'm going to get my students to play with these two and make their own, to consolidate their learning.

More ways to use flickr

I should have done this ages ago... too many things to do, and the sparkly image stuff kinda gets shoved to the bottom. Nevermind.

For parent-teacher conferences (or report day, as the principal likes to call it), I made name plates for the doors.
Last year we had budget sheets of A4 with our names written on them with a vivid, but I think these are much nicer, more personal, and look classy without taking much time to do.

I used flickr, again, to find the images. This time I got my Y13 physics class to help me (they were totally responsible for the one of Basil Brush doing an experiment while wearing 3D glasses, no matter what they may say to disclaim). I rather like the one we chose for me - apparently, I can be rather shark-like.

Then I used the 'motivator' tool over at Big Huge Lab's Flickr Toys site.

Easy. So, so easy, and the end result was something classy and a little bit nicer than a sheet of A4 with a name scrawled on it.

Another tool at Big Huge Labs makes a calendar for your desktop from a flickr image. Naturally, I made use of that, and I currently have Ian Crawford (from The Cab) gracing my desktop with a nifty little calendar in the bottom right corner. Of course, one of my colleagues saw it and asked if it was Chrissie Hynde.

The images we associate with science

So, today, as my Y9s finished their collaborative, open-book assessment. One of the first ones to finish helped me make the image to the left - I asked her to help me choose images that captured the idea of science.

We used the Big Huge Lab's flickr site to build the mosaic using images we found on flickr.

Isn't it awesome?

I have to find a way to use this in class, because it is Just. That. Great.

Also, I did have the html that would take you to flickr so you could see who took those amazing photos... but then IE crashed and I lost it. Thanks, Microsoft. So, if you stumble over this, I am so, so, sorry that I cannot correctly attribute the creative genius of the photographers.