Using Wordle to Create Character Word Clouds.

Transcription

1 Using Wordle to Create Character Word Clouds What is Wordle? Wordle is a graphic representation of the most frequently used words or most important words in a speech, a poem, a book, a historical document or from your thoughts. Words that you want emphasized would be input several times. To keep words or phrases together, use a tilde ~ between the words. One Web 2.0 tool you can use to create word clouds is Wordle. There are now additional online tools you can use as well. Wordle allows you to change the layout and color as well as print or post your Wordle to the online gallery. You can use this Web 2.0 tool for many class assignments. Ideas for Using Word Clouds Focus attention on a particular topic Use as a pre-teaching vocabulary tool Summarize chapters in a book or famous speeches Introduce the practice of idea collection prior to beginning tasks such as writing or solving problems Provides an opportunity for students to share ideas and expand their existing knowledge by building on each other's contributions About Me information Present your list of classroom rules List all the students in the class Identify most frequently misspelled words Summarize a state report unit Spelling or grammar lesson summary (i.e., contractions with examples) Poetry 1 P a g e

2 Creating Your Wordle 7. Open Internet Explorer. In the address bar, type in to get to the Wordle site. 8. Let s begin by creating a simple Wordle. Click on the Create link. 9. Copy and paste your character information from Word into the box and click on Go. 2 P a g e

3 10. The result will appear on your screen. The result for the above text is shown below: 11. Once your Word Cloud appears, you can make changes by using the menu that appears above the image: Edit, Language, Font, Layout, or Color. Clicking on Language will allow you to change from English to another language. There are also a variety of options for different typestyles available under Font. Layout will allow you to change the appearance of the words in your Word Cloud. You can opt to have all words appear in horizontal layout, vertical layout, alphabetical order, and other mixed options. 3 P a g e

4 Color will allow you to change color scheme. 12. Clicking the Randomize button under the image will change all options to create a new Wordle with the same words. 13. The Word Cloud can be printed or saved to a public gallery. Using the Advanced Feature in Wordle Using the Advanced feature in Wordle allows you to vary the size of specific words by assigning values to the words. 14. Type the title of a book. 15. Type the author of the book. 16. Type the setting for the book s story. 17. Type a character s name from the book. 18. Identify at least five traits of the character. 19. Assign a numerical value to each trait. The value can be between 15 and 165. Assign high numbers to the most important traits and lower numbers to the least important traits. a. The higher the number assigned to the trait, the larger that word or phrase will appear in your Word Cloud. 4 P a g e

5 b. Format your list similar to the one below. Do not put spaces before or after the colon (:) in your list. Example List Twilight:50 Stephenie Meyer:17 Forks:25 Edward:60 Jacob:45 Bella:65 honorable:45 brave:48 lost:23 does not give up:53 loves: Input the information for your Word Cloud in the Wordle Advanced box and click on Go. 21. The image that appears shows the words associated with higher numbers in bigger font sizes. You can now change the font color, font typeface, language, etc. You could also change the image by clicking on Randomize. Each time you click on Randomize, options change. Click until you get an image that you want to print or save. 5 P a g e

6 Printing or Saving Your Wordle Creating Word Clouds in Wordle 22. For some assignments, you may want to print. After you create your Wordle, you can click on the PRINT button located beneath the Wordle image. 23. You can also save your Wordle to a gallery for others to view by clicking on the Save to public gallery button. Copying and Cropping Your Wordle in PowerPoint After you have created your Wordle, you can take the image into other programs using the steps below: 24. Click Print Screen in the upper right hand-side of your keyboard. The PRINT SCRN button is usually to the right of F12, but you must hold down the SHIFT key and then press PRINT SCRN. 25. Open PowerPoint. 26. Paste your Wordle on the PowerPoint slide. 27. Right click on the Wordle and double click on the picture to select the picture editing tools. 28. Select the crop tool. 29. Once the crop tool is selected, black marks appear on your image on the PowerPoint slide. 6 P a g e

7 30. Crop the image by clicking and dragging the black marks as desired. 31. Reposition your image on the PowerPoint slide. 32. Save your PowerPoint slide. You may save it as a JPEG by using the drop down selection in the SAVE AS TYPE box. Note: You can also copy the Wordle into Microsoft Word and use the cropping tool on the Picture Tools Format tab. Copying to Web Back Pack (HTML Code) You can imbed a Wordle into any webpage. The directions below are for imbedding it into Shawnee Mission s Web Back Pack and using the HTML module. 1. After creating the Wordle, click on Save to public gallery. This is the only way to get the HTML code necessary to post to the web. 2. You will be prompted to save it and give it a name. You can leave the username as Anonymous if you wish. 3. Once the screen has refreshed, scroll down until you see this: 7 P a g e

8 4. Drag the mouse over the code to select and copy by either pressing Ctrl-C or right click and choose copy 5. Open your Web Back Pack in the Editing mode and move the page where you want the Wordle to appear. 6. Choose the HTML module. 7. Place mouse in the space provided and Paste the HTML code by using Crtl- V on the keyboard 8. Click on Add HTML to add it the page. You may need to move it where you want it on your page. Wordle as it appears after publishing your Web Back Pack: 8 P a g e

9 Examples of Assignments Using Wordle: Creating Word Clouds in Wordle To Kill A Mockingbird Characterization Assignment Created by Elizabeth Manthei Because Harper Lee does such an excellent job of characterization in her novel, your assignment is to choose one of the main characters and examine more in depth who this person is and how Lee characterizes them. In doing so, look for details about what the character says and does, what others say about them, and make inferences of your own about what character traits the character has. Choose one of the assignments below to accomplish this task of a close examination of a character. Option 1: Word Picture using Wordle: Create a Wordle document following the guidelines below. When you are finished, upload it at the designated Moodle forum on this week s page. Choose a character from chapters 10-14: Calpurnia, Aunt Alexandra, Scout, Jem, or Atticus Write their name at least 5 times into the Wordle document (go to Wordle.net) Find three passages that highlight this character in some way: Something they say Something they do Something said about them A description of them from Scout the narrator Paste these into the Wordle document with the names above. Now, think of 10 words of your own to describe this character, either nouns (Miss Maudie is a gardener ) or adjectives (Maudie is independent ), which really get at who they are at their core. Paste them into Wordle, repeating each one as often as you wish for the desired emphasis you wish. Customize your Wordle piece however you wish for the desired effect. When you are done, take a screen shot of the Wordle and upload it to Moodle for sharing later. (Be prepared to point out the three passages you chose to highlight this character when sharing your Wordle with the class.) 9 P a g e

10 Assignment Summary from Julie, an English in Nebraska. In my classroom, students use Wordles to evaluate literature. Recently my 9th graders used Wordles to understand tone shift. Students read the short story "The Sniper" by Liam O'Flaherty, and then using a collaborative Google Spreadsheet, shared the one word that they felt best represented the attitude of the sniper at the beginning of the story and the one word they felt best represented the sniper's attitude at the end of the story. I created Wordles from the tone words submitted by students. See the Wordles below: 1st Block - beginning and ending tone word Wordles 2nd Block - beginning and ending tone word Wordles 10 P a g e

11 Assignment Summary from Julie, an English in Nebraska. Last year, students in my classes picked out passages from the novel To Kill a Mockingbird that they felt most represented a major theme in the novel. Students typed in the text of the paragraph or passage into Wordle, and then they evaluated how the Wordle represented a major theme. I created a Wordle from one of the most famous passages in To Kill a Mockingbird below. Maybe you can recognize it. I also used Wordle to create a word cloud of the novels that are required 9th grade reads in my school district. I then uploaded the image, added one of my favorite quotes about reading, and bought the poster from Big Huge Labs. 11 P a g e

12 Preparing Assignments Prior to having students create a Wordle, some preparation must be completed. You might create an assignment sheet asking the students to create a Word document. Having the text in Word will allow the student to copy and paste into Wordle, which will save time if the Wordle needs to be restarted. Student Assignment: Character Traits Input the following information in a Word document. You will not need to format the document. 1. Type the title of a book. 2. Type the author of the book. 3. Type the setting for the book s story. 4. Type a character s name from the book. Type the character s name approximately 10 more times. The more times a word is typed, the more important Wordle treats the word. The more important words will appear larger. 5. Identify at least five traits of the character. Type each trait two or three times. 6. Type names of other characters about three or four times each. 7. Save your document for use in Wordle. 12 P a g e