Word Clouds for Younger Grades

Word clouds are a fun way to present words visually.

Kindergarten/PreK teachers can create posters to put up around the classroom as they teach the letter(s) of the week. A great site for this is ImageChef. Here's an example I created of the letter S made up of all sorts of age-appropriate words that begin with the letter S.

How do you do this? Choose "Word Mosaic". Click on the Initials tab. Type in the letter you want to work with. Type all of the words that start with that letter that you want to use in the text box. Choose the Font style you like from the drop down menu. Click on Preview to see your creation. If you want to save the image to your computer, click on Export...choose an image size...right-click and save the image to your computer or drag the image to your desktop. To make a poster, insert the image into Word, Publisher, or some other program.

First and second grade students can easily create word clouds of their own. You might want to start with a site like Wordle, a very easy site to use. I've had the first and second graders create Mother's Day word clouds similar to the one here to give as a gift. They had fun choosing the layout, fonts, and colors to really personalize it for their mom.

How do you do this? You might want to brainstorm possible words to use before you begin this activity. Then have those words available on a handout or projected somewhere in your classroom. Type your words in the text box. Remember that in Wordle, the size of a word is determined by the number of times it is typed in the text box. Click GO when you have finished adding words. To personalize your word cloud, you can select options from the Font, Layout, and Color tabs. When your word cloud is finished, you can print it. One downside of Wordle is that you can't download the finished image. To get around this, I use PrintScreen to copy the whole desktop and then paste it into Paint. Then crop the excess and save the image.

Once the younger students have mastered the art of creating a word cloud in Wordle, you could have the third, fourth, and fifth grade students use a site like Tagxedo to create something a little more advanced. Since it is winter, we are going to create snowflake word clouds like the one here. The students are reading Snowflake Bentley and learning how each snowflake is unique. These snowflake word clouds will represent each unique student in our class.

How do you do this? Have the students create a list of words that describe themselves. Choose the snowflake shape from the Shapes menu. Click on Load... under the Words category. Type the words in the text box (not the webpage box). To personalize the look of the snowflake, students can adjust the color, font, layout, etc... When you are ready to finish, download the image to your computer by clicking on Save|Share|Print.

Have fun creating these visuals to post in the classroom, to give as gifts, or to reinforce concepts learned in class!

Keyboarding Boot Camp

Several years ago I found a great idea on Beth Newingham's website for a keyboarding camp. She has explained her ideas in this article: Take Your Students to Typing Camp! I really liked her ideas, but had to modify them a bit to make it work for my situation. I only see the third graders twice a week, so I wouldn't be able to spend a whole week or two dedicated to a typing camp unit.

I changed our theme slightly from Keyboarding Camp to Keyboarding Boot Camp. Each student has a dog tag with their name on it. These are hanging on the wall in our Computer Lab at the beginning of the school year and create a nice display. The students wear their dog tags during class and are able to keep them once we have finished all of our keyboarding lessons. As soon as we have learned all of the keys that spell a student's name, I take a picture of them wearing their dog tag and add it to the display. It's exciting to see who will be able to type their name each time!

Not only do students get to keep their dog tags when we finish our keyboarding boot camp, they are also able to earn other charms to add to their chain. For example students earn a hand charm when they have successfully completed all of the keyboarding lessons. You could be creative with this and give charms for other reasons as well. (I purchased dog tags, chains, and charms from Fitness Finders, Inc.)

I wrote a Keyboarding Boot Camp chant that has three verses. The refrain lists the home row keys. The hope is that learning and singing this will help them remember the home row keys which will in turn help them with correct placement of their hands on the keyboard.

The students learn the first verse the first day of our boot camp.

Left, left, left-right-left

We are learning the home row

These are the keys we have to know

Our fingers stay on these eight keys

Reach somewhere but come home please

Sound off: a, s

Sound off: d, f

A, s, d, f, j, k, l, semicolon!

They learn the second verse after completing lessons on the Home Row.

Left, left, left-right-left

Now we know the whole home row

Learning keys, we’re on a roll

Press the space bar with one thumb

Don’t use two, that would be dumb

Sound off: a, s

Sound off: d, f

A, s, d, f, j, k, l, semicolon!

They learn the third verse after learning all of the keys.

Left, left, left-right-left

We finished learning all the keys

Our parents surely will be pleased

Keyboarding boot camp was lots of fun

We’re sad to say that it’s all done

Sound off: a, s

Sound off: d, f

A, s, d, f, j, k, l, semicolon!

As we learn each verse, I record them singing it and post it on our school site using Audioboo.

The Keyboarding Boot Camp theme adds some excitement and fun to keyboarding which could be a little dull and monotonous otherwise. Thanks to Beth Newingham for the inspiration!

Type that Christmas Tune

One of the fun activities that grades 4-8 do in Computers just before Christmas break is called Type that Christmas Tune. It's a great way to practice keyboarding skills and have some fun at the same time. We listen to instrumental versions of various Christmas songs, and the students have to type the name of the song. I use some of the more recognizable songs for the lower grades and use some of the more difficult songs with the older students. After I play 10 different tracks, we go through each one again and name the tune. The student(s) with the most titles correct wins a little prize. I usually get candy cane pens from the local Walgreens for a reasonable price. This activity could really be done with any kind of music at any time of the year.