MizzB is a mom to a 10 year-old, a working teacher, and a produced playwright. She teaches in a high poverty elementary in LA, where she tries to keep creatively and technologically afloat in the murky waters of educational bureaucracy and high-stakes testing.
My 6th grader came home the first week of school desperate not to bend a 24” x 12” sheet of green construction paper. He guarded it like a secret service agent on a presidential candidate.
“What’s that for?” I asked. “My ‘All About Me’ project,” he replied glumly. “I’ve got to cut and paste all about me.”
The next three days were spent printing and cutting out pictures and text, getting mad at dysfunctional glue sticks, and discovering ever more sticky spots all over the dining table.
Why, in 2008, would a 6th grader need to waste so much time on glue and scissors skills? Why not do an online poster that required 21st century skills?
Glogster is a terrific site that lets kids (and grown-ups) transform a blank page into a creative wonderland. You can choose from a variety of wallpapers and graphics. You can upload, manipulate, and play around with pictures. You can use your wecam to grab live stills, video, or sound, or link to youtube or other sites, or upload your own mp3 files or videos. And then you can think about layout and design to create a multimedia collage that can be made public or left private. It can be shared via all the usual sites.
Much more interesting than construction paper and pictures, and you don’t have to worry about the paper getting bent or goopy tabletops. A much more fun all about him!
Visit MizzB’s new blog, Tattle Teaching, or e-mail her at askmizzb at gmail dot com.
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Original post by Tech Savvy Mama
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What an awesome site. I would even have fun using Glogster! I’m trying to come up with a reason to use it now. 🙂
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