The first topic I decided to learn more about is infographics. Infographics are visuals that can take any topic and present it to an audience in a different way, making it more understandable to a wider audience. Take the Vietnam War for example. In 1982 it was built to honor and remember those that died or went missing in action. I could sit here and write out a paragraph or list of facts about the wall, but who want to read that? Instead, I can show you this.
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| from History.com |
My extent of using infographics started and stopped with the picture to your left. I had no idea I could make my own visuals like this one if I found the right website.
I am excited to say that I took some time tonight to look into a list of infographic creators: easelly, infogr.am, infographic archieve, ManyEyes, Piktochart, and usual.ly.
The first site I explored was easelly. Right off the bat the creators I have nice Prezi video that explains how to navigate their website. I notice lots of these webtools do this and I couldn't appreciate it more! Positives include easily signing up with my Google+ account, the ease of moving around the website, cloning objects, and saving to share. Negatives include the time it takes. I could see myself spending an hour trying to make one great graphic for my students. Another negative is there was no search bar for finding objects. And my final concern was the limit of graphics available. If I wanted more there was a monthly fee.
Here is the one I made! Not too bad for my first one.
I also spent some time playing around on the Infographic site, Piktochart. This page also had a nice explanatory video for users to watch. Like easelly, you have to sign up (I did so easily again with Google+) and there is an option to pay for more features. Right away I got a tutorial from someone at Piktochart who gave me cheat sheets for making the best infographic possible. I did not go all the way through with making another graphic from this site, but I did enjoy exploring its features.
Good observations, Lisa. As a rule, I tend toward visual organizers more than infographics for the very reason you mentioned--they take quite a while to create. Though, they are impressive. I use it as a 2-3 week project for middle schoolers (at 45 minutes twice a week)--that's a commitment.
ReplyDeleteI like your analysis of CC. You remind me of one point that I think is often forgotten about the benefit of CC: Subjects like reading (and vocabulary) are taught across subjects, not just in one class. Duh. Sounds like common sense.