"Technology Teacher" - MLK in June

I began my first time at working in the computer lab with the summer camp kids with using Tagxedo, which they were familiar with from making Tagxedo landscapes earlier and also ties for Father's Day cards. What the students did is research information about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. online, then type words or phrases into a Word doc and copy and paste what they came up with into Tagxedo. I had brought in an image found on the internet of Dr. King. that I had tested earlier to make sure it would work with Tagxedo. The students then experimented with different colors, fonts, and layouts as the Web 2.0 tool allows you to do. It was pretty much as I expected it would work out: the students were engaged and enjoyed creating them. Here are some examples of their work:

 

 

Then I put them on a class blog and gave the students the link. Next time I will have them write about their own work and make comments on one or two of their classmates' work. This will also be a great time to begin talking about digital citizenship. 

I think the next project that would work well with this theme is a Blabberize using a picture of Martin Luther King Jr. and with students each reading a portion of his "I Have a Dream" speech or else a first person account of some events in his life.

Since we have a lot of Legos at work my boss is interested in having the students build a Lego city together and also having a Lego building contest of anything they want to create. I thought a great thing that they could create with in the computer lab that would go together well with Lego building is Google SketchUp.  

SketchUp is a program used to create 3D drawings and is used by architects, engineers, and designers, not to mention students and people who enjoy using computers to create art. It comes in two forms: basic, SketchUp, which is a free download, and SketchUpPro which is around $500. I accidentally downloading SketchUpPro, the free one month trial in the beginning and later downloaded the basic SketchUp for free. They are different - but all I need is the basic so I'll stay with that for now.

To introduce them to the program I would do a quick showing of what the tools can do and then show students a screencast of making something such as a house or building. Then I would let them go to it and they would have the screencast to refer to for initial help - Sketchup actually comes with a ton of built-in help and I would show them that as well. It's definitely exciting to be able to show students some of what I learned in Technology class and have it tie to other things that they are working on and learning about. And I think it's additionally great to be able to show students tools and applications that they may possibly use at their work later on in life.

Here is a blog post by middle school art teacher, Mr. G, that I found in a search that has some terrific examples of what his students created with SketchUp:

mrgsbwmsblogger.blogspot.com/2011/10/google-sketchup-student-gallery-fall.html