EDIM 508: Glog Reflection

This is the second opportunity I have had to use Glogster for a graduate course at Wilkes, and I can't say enough positive things about this web tool.  I am truly excited to offer this as a resource to my students in the upcoming school year.  In previous years, I have had students experiment with sites such as Prezi and Mediachalk to create projects, so I am confident that they would be excited to use Glogster and would be able to easily navigate the controls to create something brilliant. 

One way in which I would like to use Glogster in my class is to offer a Glog as a book report option.  Students could easily create a poster representing the book they chose to read that would be much more dynamic than a simple book report or cut-and-paste collage.  Students could include character information, a plot summary, pictures, and even sound or video files they create themselves.  A glog would also make a great alternative assignment for our science labs.  Instead of writing a standard lab report, students could include their data and even pictures or video from their experiment all on one convenient Glog page.

I think these options would really appeal to the more visual and design-minded students.  They could also help all of my students to continue to develop their creative mind because they must use the information they have gathered and choose just how to present it in both an understandable and an artistic way.  Students are truly creating a masterpiece in this case.  Another benefit of using Glogster is knowing that the standards of the curriculum are definitely being met; students must fully understand the content in order to know just how to present and arrange the information and resources on their page.  Technology standards would be met as an added bonus as students tinker with the concept of graphic design, research skills, and using online resources.

I am excited to introduce Glogster to my incoming group of 6th graders this year.  When I do so, I will be sure to have plenty of examples to share with them, including this Glog that will go hand-in-hand with the introduction to our solar system unit: http://aevans.edu.glogster.com/the-solar-system/.