Teacher's Guide to Using Glogster in the Classroom

A new technology has arrived that will rock the poster board's world and hopefully your classroom. Glogster EDU is a new program that allows you to create a virtual, interactive poster utilizing art, photographs, text, sound and even video. Many of your students are probably already using this program, making glogs about their favorite bands, topics, and writing poetry. It is a lot like scrap booking for their generation. You might even enlist your students help to show you how to use it.

Students can create glogs about an unlimited amount of topics. Biographies, parts of speech, book reports, essays are just a few of the ways this technology could be used. I usually advise my students to begin by choosing from hundreds of backgrounds. Then I encourage them to add their title. Next,they can add photographs they find on the Internet or videos from SchoolTube. Last, the students can add text boxes that communicate the information about their topic. My students have most recently created blogs about the different biomes in the world and then presented them to the class. They learned so much more about their topic searching for images and trying to find facts than they would have through a worksheet or even making a PowerPoint.

Glogster EDU allows teachers to create a virtual classroom. Each student has their own profile and password. Teachers can monitor their progress and chat with students online as they work. Leave a comment on a glog or have students comment on each other's glogs, which is similar to how they will communicate in future college classes. Glogster EDU also protects the glogs so they are all private and only able to be seen by the classmates and instructor. Glogster EDU is a creative, dynamic outlet that requires students to evaluate and synthesize information in order to produce a glog. It is also a highly visual and auditory medium that is highly motivating for students.

Visit Glogster EDU's web site and you will find lesson plan suggestions, quotes from teachers who use the program and videos about successful implementation of glogster in the classroom. So skip the essay, poster, even multiple-choice test and assign your students a glog topic. They will impress you with what they know!

Source: personal experience
www.edu.glogster.com