Collaborative+Efforts-Arts

toc =Collaborative Efforts-Arts=

Often, we neglect the right-brained learners in our classrooms due to the constraints placed on us by testing or the pace of curriculum. However, I like to make the case that the inclusion of such elements in the classroom does wonders for the happiness of students, thus their performance on other tasks is positively affected as well. (suggested reading regarding this is Dan Pink's //[|A Whole New Mind]//)

In short: they need to be creative and view their work as play.

Several tools are out there that do just that, and we can use them to help our students create fantastic work.

Flickr
We viewed Jeff Utecht's video yesterday explaining the difference between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0. He talked about how Kodak Easy Share was a 1.0 application, while Flickr was a 2.0 application. Why? Some more academic uses of the web (taken from Derek Baird's 2005 article [|The Promise of Social Networking])
 * Kodak was about loading pictures for you to see and print
 * Flickr is about loading pictures for everyone, or at least the people you select, to view, print, comment on, and share.
 * Kodak was a one-way platform
 * Within Flickr, you can create groups, create blogs, email other Flickr users, search everyone's images for one that matches your needs, and create porfolios from your images to share on the web. For example:media type="custom" key="136917"
 * During an online synchronous class, the instructor uses the Photostream feature as an alternative to a PowerPoint presentation. After the class, the Photoset is available for asynchronous viewing at the student’s leisure.
 * After a field trip to a living history museum, student groups write a summary of their trip in a blog and use //Flickr// to illustrate their report. They are able to augment their own photos with relevant images found by searching tags in the global //Flickr// community archives. As they work on the project they are simultaneously developing writing, technology, photography, as most importantly collaborative learning skills.
 * An online instructor scans diagrams, charts, or other materials and then posts them using //Flickr// directly into the course blog or newsgroup. By sharing the URL of a specific picture it can be used as an e-handout during a synchronous course lecture.
 * Or you can create groups around a specific tag.

Imagination Cubed
I just love this one; like Google Sketchup, it has study hall written all over it. However, it also has some truly fantastic uses in the classroom. Essentially, [|Imagination Cubed] is a whiteboard that can be edited by anyone you invite. The good folks at GE have created this site for us to play with. Here are some application ideas for classroom use:


 * math tutoring via the whiteboard. Have students use this space to help one another solve equations and save the board. They can replay them to see the steps as they happen.
 * Graphing. Using the background graph paper, you can turn your computer screen and whiteboard into an instant piece of graph paper, plus you can invite students to graph with you simultaneously.

What can you think of?

Others like imagination cubed:
 * [|skrbl]
 * [|Virtual Whiteboard]

ToonDoo
Often, we ask students to draw out their ideas to help them express what they need to. If you are like me, that would be the kiss of death. Along comes [|ToonDoo] to help the artistically impaired create relevant images and cartoons.


 * Students can create their own political cartoons using ToonDoo's stock images.
 * This can be offered as an alternative assignment after a novel study
 * Allow students to use cartoons to express complex issues in society.
 * Students can use humor to show understanding of topics and issues.