I still struggle with good ways to incorporate wordle into the classroom. But, I think I may have found one. I used 2 different Web 2.0 tools - primary wall and wordle in my 2nd grade technology class. Primary Wall is a super easy sticky note website that requires no registration. Wordle creates a word cloud from the text that you enter. So before beginning my unit on the Internet, I had students go to a Primary Wall that I had created and type in all the words they could think of that had to do with the Internet. Our goal was to try and hit every letter of the alphabet, but we didn't quite make that. I then took all of the words and typed them into Wordle to create a word cloud. By doing this it showed which words students were most familiar with on the Internet. I then posted the wordle on my website and as a class we discussed what we saw on the wordle and why some words were bigger than others. It gave me as the teacher a better idea as to how much the students knew and how much material I needed to cover. After teaching the lessons, I plan to repeat this same activity and see how the wordle changes. I'm hoping that the words grow and that some words no longer make the list and that some new ones do. So my wordle actually becomes my assessment of the unit.
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AuthorLuann Langel, Technology Coordinator ~ IKM-Manning Schools, Manning, IA Archives
August 2012
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