Grade Keeper: Wordle in Education.

Wordle is a very interesting web2.0 tool . It is a fun application that creates “ word clouds” from text that you provide. The key words or words that occur repeatedly in the text become prominent in the cloud and the ones which are used the least are the smallest units of this cloud . The visual aspects of word clouds are interestingly eye-catching which in turn provides many opportunities for educational use.

Some features of wordle

Let me walk you through some of the most interesting features of Wordle :

Wordle is a free and easy to use service
It does not require any account registration
You can tweak your clouds with different color schemes, layouts and fonts
The clouds Wordle creates for you are images that you can use as you wish
You can print , save or share your images with your friends

How can I get started using Wordle ?

First go to Wordle main page and click on “ create “ . You will be directed to the page where you can either :

Paste in a bunch of text
Enter the url of any blog , or any other web that has an atom or rss feed .
Enter a delicious name to see their tags

Whichever you choose , you click on submit and you will get the result.
To customize your cloud use the tool bar on the top of the image , you can change its color ; layout, font ,and language.
Under the image you will find buttons to open your cloud in a new window , print it , randomize it , or save it to public gallery.
Here is a Wordle cloud I created for my this blog using the web2.0 tool Wordle

To learn more about Wordle visit their FAQ page
You can also watch this video tutorial for better understanding of how to use this web2.0 tool .

wordle tutorial

Applications of wordle in education

Here are some ideas on how we can use Wordle in the classroom with our students :

Wordle can be used as a reflection tool at the end of the semester with students compiling a list of the main terms or ideas of what they had learnt during the whole term .
students can use it to summarize the content of a lesson or reading activity
They can also use it for self reflection . Teachers can provide a word cloud on a certain topic and students write essays and articles based on the clouds provided

That’s it about Wordle in Education.