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Piktochart: Create your own infographics

October 9, 2012Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment10899 views

What it is: Piktochart is a great web app that makes it easy to create your own infographics. Piktochart has free and premium options. With the free version, there are a handful of themes to choose from. Premium themes are also available, if you are so inclined. After you choose a theme, the next job is to change the mood and edit the information on the chart. Students can add shapes, graphics (uploaded), theme graphics, and text to the infographic. Students can add a chart where they manually input data or upload a cvc file. This is especially helpful if they have been data collecting in another program. There are some features that are only available to pro users. Not to worry, there are enough available for free that you can make a pretty rockin’ infographic that gets the point (or data) across.

How to integrate Piktochart into the classroom: Piktochart is a superb way for students to work on those statistics/probability standards. Being a visual learner myself, I love the way that infographics seem to make data easier to digest. Piktochart can be used to display any type of statistical or mathematical data in new ways. Students can show what they are learning in history, about the world population (miniature earth), science, in the book they are reading, geography statistics, etc.

The way that infographics allow students to blend learning across the subject areas is fantastic. It isn’t just math; it is math, and art, and science/social studies/history/geography/technology. Any time we can help students recognize the overlaps that exist in learning and subject area, it is a win!

A few weeks ago, students at Anastasis discovered that America’s biggest export is trash. They started digging and found statistics about the amount of trash Americans throw away each day (7lbs/person) and how much was recycled vs. what ended up in a landfill. They also looked at statistics of what receiving countries like China and India did with the waste being imported. It was fascinating! Students created infographics showing what they had discovered in their research. It was eye-opening when they translated that trash per person into a year’s worth of trash and figured out how many football stadiums that it would fill. When they could see it graphically, it had an impact on their thinking. The result was: “it is up to us to change this…”

Pretty amazing when the conclusion to learning is transformation…change.

Tips: In the free version: Basic themes, 5 image uploads, Piktochart’s watermark. Pro version ($29.00/mo): 80 themes (and growing), additional customization, more image uploads, no watermark.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Piktochart in your classroom.

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Oddizzi: where the world comes to life

October 17, 2011Kelly Tenkely5 Comments3362 views

What it is: I love those serendipitous moments in life where the stars seem to align and everything that comes your way is tailor made to meet your needs. This resource filled those needs for me this week! At Anastasis, our primary students are working on an inquiry unit about how transportation has changed over time and how transportation is used in different locations in the world. What should appear in my inbox than a little note from the people over at Oddizzi inviting me to take a look at their content. Serendipitous I tell you. Oddizzi is a paid-for service but they have sample content on their site to give you a taste of what you can expect. That sample content is free and has made my day. It may make yours too, you should head over and have a look! Oddizzi brings the world to life in a way I have seen few other resources pull off. Students have access to their very own interactive map where they can view places, physical features, global features, places of interest, my story and class pals. Students can click on each feature on the map to learn more in popup bubble. The content below the map is rich including student-friendly text, videos, “secret” facts, images and more. Oddizzi is a great way to teach about geography, global issues, math, citizenship and multicultural topics. One feature that I have found to be really useful is the “Sneak-a-Peak” option which condenses a page of content down to one page of easy to read sentences. Perfect for differentiating for your different reading levels while maintaining a topic thread for the whole class. Odd and Izzi are fun characters that lead students through the site revealing hidden secrets as they go.

How to integrate Oddizzi into the classroom: Oddizzi is a fantastic way for students to explore geography and culture. Use Oddizzi sample content to introduce a lesson or unit, as a place for students to gather research, or as a center activity on classroom computers. In the Sample Content you will find information on Egypt, transportation in India, Rivers and Games (flags from around the world and a game about Egypt).

Oddizzi is a great place to spur interest in geography and encourages students to learn more. We will use the Transport in India content to help students think about questions they can ask about how transportation is used in other countries.

Geography is a subject that is often overlooked in schools in the United States. Oddizzi helps bridge the gap between geography and other disciplines such as reading, writing, communicating, math, social studies, history, etc. No excuses!

Use Oddizzi as a starting point for students to gather facts, information and gain a general understanding of geography and culture. Students can use that information to create a poem about the country or location. At Anastasis, @leadingwlove did an incredible project with students where they each chose a country they wanted to learn more about. After learning about the country, they wrote a poem. Each made a large thumbprint on an 8.5 x 11 piece of paper and inside the thumbprint left a negative space of the outline of the country. They wrote their poems on the lines of the fingerprint. The result was incredible! Students learned a lot, practiced writing poetry and created a masterpiece to boot! Since our students are in a one-to-one iPad environment, they took this a step further and took pictures of their finished products and added special photo effects to make a one-of-a-kind digital masterpiece for their e-portfolios. SO awesome! You can see the beginning of one of these poems below…

Tips: In the subscription version of Oddizzi, you can connect with other classes around the globe in a secure learning environment. This allows your students to send online postcards to other students around the world so that they can learn first hand what life is like around the globe. Neat! A curriculum zone offers teachers resources for integrating Oddizzi across multiple disciplines for transdiciplinary learning. In addition, the subscription version has “Over to you” where students can contribute content to the site. If you are interested in testing out these additional features, request a free trial of Oddizzi for your class here.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Oddizzi in your classroom!

Where’s George: Track US currency

December 15, 2010Kelly Tenkely2 Comments2227 views

What it is: Where’s George is a neat site that lets your students track the travel of dollar bills through circulation. Users of the site mark their bills with the website address, and follow the adventure of their money. On the Where’s George site, students can enter the serial number on the bill, enter their current zip code and learn about where their bill has been. If your bill doesn’t have a tracking history, you can start tracking it. Add a short note about the bill including where it was found, what condition it is in, etc. Students and classes can choose to receive an email when the next person finds and records the bill’s next location. In addition to tracking bills, you can view a report by zip code, state, bill denomination, or county.

How to integrate Where’s George into your curriculum: Where’s George is a great site to use as part of a money or currency unit. Let your students track their money and watch the journey of their money unfold. Students can track their lunch money, donation money, or sports club money. Track a dollar with your class for an entire school year. Enter the dollar serial number as a class at the beginning of the school year, record information about it, and write the Where’s George web address on the dollar. Use a class email address to track the bill throughout the year. Map where the dollar travels. Toward the end of the year, have your students write a story about the adventures their dollar has had, including the places it has visited, and the kind of people they imagine that it met on its travels. This is sure to spark some creative stories!

*** When using the site with students make sure to preview where the bill has been before sharing with students, sometimes those bills visit some interesting places that may need to be screened (i.e. strip club). Always preview first!

Tips: Need a different currency to track? Check out this page to find your country’s currency (Europe, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Russia, Switzerland, India, South Africa, Australia, Sweden, Denmark, Japan, China, Taiwan, and Germany). There is also a neat site called Book Crossing that tracks books that you have read and released. Cool!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Where’s George in your classroom!

The Street: World Music

November 29, 2010Kelly Tenkely4 Comments2580 views

What it is: I am currently working on a fun project for Starrmatica tagging and organizing websites and resources. One of the resources that was new to me is The Street: World Music. This is a neat interactive learning journey from BBC radio where students can learn about other countries and cultures through music. The Street features five families from five different countries including India, Ireland, Brazil, Turkey, and Nigeria. In each house students can learn more about the country, instruments, musicians, religion, and food from the country. Students have plenty of opportunities to listen to the music.

How to integrate The Street: World Music into your curriculum: Music is a neat way to introduce students to other cultures. It allows an inside look into the culture by sharing the sounds of the culture. What I like about The Street, is the way the music is introduced along side religion, food, and information about the country. This site gives students a wonderful overview of five countries where they can not only read about the differences, but they can see the differences (through photos) and hear the differences (through music). The Street is a great site to introduce into any classroom, music teachers will appreciate the look at the instruments and musicians of the country. As an extension activity, have your students create their own “house” for The Street. This can be done offline with paper and a collection of music, photos, and information. Alternatively use a website builder like Weebly or Wix or a Wiki to collect the information in an online space. Students can choose a country to learn more about or create a house for their own country, thinking about what is important to their culture. Want to extend the activity even more? Connect with teachers from different countries and have the students learn about different cultures together. Use Skype or Wetoku to connect the classes and play music from each culture. Create a wiki together to collect and share information learned.

Tips: If you are looking for teachers to collaborate with, use and search the #glolab hash tag to connect.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using The Street: World Music in your classroom!