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Monday, April 9, 2012

Tagxedo

In an earlier blog Darcie had posted a blog about Wordle. I was looking into her Wordle and it looked creative and I wanted to comment on it. As I was commenting I saw that Prof. Judy had posted a comment to check out Tagxedo. My curious mind told me to check it out. Well to my surprise I liked it and had to try it. I wanted to see how to use it and how to integrate it in different ways.  I found this helpful google document:  101 ways to Use Tagxedo. Hope this helps you and you might want to check it out.
If you have a mac computer, it might be tricky at first. I just downloaded Google chrome and silverlight is not compatible with it. So I had to go back to safari after 20 minutes of trying to figure out why it wasn't working. I couldn't figure out how to embed the picture to make the words spin and pop out. However, I was able to save it as a jpeg and upload it onto here.
Here is what I created while using it:

I think this website would be great for students to use to describe themselves or other people (book characters, biographies, etc.), also a great use for vocabulary. The fun part of Tagxedo is that you can create a word cloud in different images, in Wordle you are not able to. However, Wordle was easier to use. I can see my students using Wordle better than Tagxedo, especially since they are in second grade. 

How would you use Tagxedo? If anyone finds out how to make it easier for Mac Computers please let me know! 
What do you like best Tagxedo or Wordle? Why?

NETs for Students: 1 and 2
NETs for Teachers: 1, 2 and 3

2 comments:

  1. I loved the site! I instantly thought of several ways I could use this in the classroom! I love your idea of having them use their words to describe themselves. I usually have them write positives things about each other on paper using the outlining of their hand, but this tool is way cooler!!

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  2. Love this site too! Thank you Taini! I like how you can chose the shape you create. It is a great idea to have students make one at the beginning of the year to introduce themselves to the class. I usually have students describe/draw their family, favorite things about school and home, words to describe them, etc... As Meghan said this is way cooler! They can print it out and make a bulletin board for Open House.

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