The Web2.0 tool for the week is brought to you by Big Huge Labs and can be found at http://bighugelabs.com/deck.php. What is this tool you ask? It is the Trading Card Creator and it allows you to use images and text to create trading cards or create a card game. When I was in the classroom, I had students create trading cards about specific topics and then share them as a way for students to learn. Students would do research projects and then create their trading cards based on their research. I had students use PowerPoint to create their cards from templates. I wish I had the Trading Card Creator tool when I was in the classroom. This tool makes it much easier for students to create their trading cards. The applications and uses for this tool in the classroom are limitless. Trading cards can be created based on important people in history, teachers in the school, students in class, animals, habitats, countries, states, characters from a novel or anything else you can imagine. This is a great way to make simple study cards, assist ESL and dual language students or help young students with word/image associations. Using the Trading Card creator is simple and allows you to upload your own pictures or pull images in from Facebook or Flickr. You will pick your card design, enter a title, a subtitle (optional) and type in your text. You have the option of also adding up to 7 pre-created icons to your card. Hit create and your trading card is ready. Don't like what you see...click edit and make changes. When the trading card is complete, you are able to either save it to your computer or share it to Facebook, Flickr, Twitter or email it out. I recommend printing trading cards on cardstock paper if students will be sharing them for studying and learning purposes. Be creative with your Trading Card creations and share to learn.
This is an awesome tool. I can see incorporating this into my book project repertoire. I'm always trying to find ways to get my middle school students to dig in deep to the characters they read about and they could use this tool to do just that! I can't wait to check it out. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteThis is a great tool! It reminds me of the jigsaw method where students are put into groups and become an experts on a topic, then the groups are divided into groups made of one member from each group and share their knowledge with each other. By having the first set of groups make a trading card on their topic to hand out to the second group would help the students pass on their knowledge instead of everyone taking notes. Great idea, thank you for sharing.
ReplyDeleteHow interesting. I can see this being so useful to teach History (one of my worst subjects). If there was something of this magnitude when
ReplyDeleteI was in school and trying to learn history I have to believe that I might have understood it a little better and been more interested. So many kids are visual learners such as myself and this is a fantastic visual tool. Thanks a bunch for finding this one. Adding it to my list right now!