Backyard Photo Safari

For this week's DS106 assignment, I decided to stick with the visual assignments because they are my favorite.  I chose one that might be boring for some, but the application to the classroom could be very powerful.  It is a backyard photo safari that takes viewers on a photo journey through someone's yard.  Now my backyard is fairly plain, but I chose this assignment because I was thinking about applying it to the classroom.

One of the most powerful things I learned through CU Denver's Urban Teacher Program was how important it is to allow the students to bring their own culture and funds of knowledge into the classroom.  I thought this backyard photo journey could be a really cool way for me to get to know the students at the beginning of the year and for the students to get to know each other.  It wouldn't necessarily have to be their backyards, it could be anything.

In my current school, we would probably have to modify this a bit by either doing it in class together or by using actual pictures the kids have, not digital.  For some, this could be homework during the first week of school and have students share on Friday, for example.  This assignment would teacher the kids about creating digital slide shows and allow them to learn to be digital storytellers!

Here is my photo journey!



  

Story Map - A Trip through France

Nice

For this week's DS106 Assignment we got to choose a topic based on our interest.  I enjoyed the visual assignment I completed a few weeks ago, so I decided to try a new one.  There was one assignment that caught my eye last time but I didn't take the time to figure out the website I had to use to complete it.  This week I have more time so I tried again, turns out it wasn't that hard!

Omaha Beach

The assignment calls for you use a website called StoryMap to create an interactive map telling a story of a trip you took.  Last summer I went to France to meet up with my mom who lives in Madrid.  This story map is a very cool website that allows you to add pictures, descriptions and captions to a places you have visited and adds a pin point of that exact location on an interactive map.

Applying StoryMap to the Classroom
This would be a really cool activity to incorporate in the classroom.  When kids comes back to school they could make a story map of a trip they took over the summer, winter or spring breaks.  They could also use story map to accompany a history project, for example the route Christopher Columbus took, or the history of their family and where they came from.  The website is fairly straightforward and could be taught to a class easily.  Story map is a great replacement for the old-fashioned Power Point!

*The only thing I would change about Story Map is being able to add more than one picture per place.  I Googled it and the creator said he didn't want to make it too complicated (not sure more than one picture would complicate it, but oh well).

Unfortunately, I could not figure out how to embed my story map using html so you'll have to click through the link to see it...sorry for the inconvenience!

France 2014