Resource Number 22

URL www.wordle.net Keywords word processing, spelling, word formation, collaboration

Wordle
Category 9 Funny Text-based Tasks Rationale

Maintaining students motivation and attention is very important for effective language learning. Improving writing skills is necessary for students future professional development. Using Wordle enables teachers to put these two necessities together. By active approach and participation in a task students will widen their vocabulary, learn how to spell properly and also develop and improve their collaborative skills. Description Wordle is a tool for generating word clouds from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and colour schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends. If you choose to save your Wordle cloud to the online gallery, a link appears after doing so and you can paste the link into your blog or home page to link to the Wordle. The Wordle front page will never feature images or links that are inappropriate for classroom use. Therefore, it's possible to configure an institution's "site-blocking" software to keep Wordle safe for classroom use. Simply have your networking administrator block the following base URLs: http://www.wordle.net/gallery http://www.wordle.net/next http://www.wordle.net/random and your users will not be inadvertently shown anything that's not safe for classrooms.

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The project Autonomous Personal Learning Networks for Language Teachers has been funded with support from the European Commission. This document reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Resources required There is no need to install any additional software to your computer. Obligatory resources: desktop computer or laptop reliable and stable Internet connection Java web-browser plugin (you must ensure that Java applets are enabled in your browser) Cost Completely free Setup and Configuration To start using Wordle, you do not need to set up an account or register. You only operate within your internet browser. All you have to do is to go to www.wordle.net and click on Create on the main page. Make sure you have installed Java web-browser plugin to your computer and that Java applets are enabled in your browser. If Java does not work on your computer, neither will Wordle. Test if Java is working on your computer on http://www.java.com/en/download/testjava.jsp Styling In terms of styling, Wordle supports many formatting features. There are many options in font size and styles. You can also choose from different layouts and colours of your words. If you click on Randomize, the application will randomly choose different styles of the word cloud you created. If you wish some words to be bigger than the others, you need to write them down repeatedly. The more times you repeat the word, the bigger it will be in the created word cloud. That means the more times the word appears in the used text, the bigger it will be in the final cloud. As there is a public gallery of user word clouds, teachers can direct students to browse the gallery for inspiration. Navigation and operation To create your own word cloud you need to go to www.wordle.net and click on Create on the top of the main page. Then you have three options how to create your word cloud: paste bunch of text in an application window provided enter the URL of any blog, blog feed, or any other web pate that has an Atom or RSS feed enter a del.icio.us user name to see their tags If you use the application window, write all words you want to use (using comma or a space among the words) and then click on Go button below the window to create a word cloud. Created word cloud can be printed out or saved to public gallery on Wordle web page. If you enter a blog's URL, the application will create a word cloud using all words found on the blog's front page. If you use URL of any blog feed, the word cloud will be created from words found on the specific page. Entering a del.icio.us user name you create a word cloud using the user's tags. Implementation methodology Wordle can be used in the classroom as additional activity to maintain students motivation and attention. As it helps practise students writing skills and spelling, the teacher may give individual students or small groups of students a task to create a word cloud using different groups of words. Groups of words can be related to different topics worked on within the class. Teaching/Learning ideas: collaboration on a task with fellow students practising spelling and writing skills foreign language learning through creative and active participation

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The project Autonomous Personal Learning Networks for Language Teachers has been funded with support from the European Commission. This document reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Example of implementation Type of lesson: General English course Level: B1 of CEFR Lesson Title: Creation of word clouds using Wordle Age group: upper secondary Number of students involved: 20 Duration: project work - 1 week deadline The aim of the lesson is to ask students to use a group of words related to a specific topic and use Wordle to create a word cloud. Students can work individually, in small groups or pairs. Group work maintains collaboration among students. The lesson will be based on online collaborative writing. Warm-up: Present the topic of the lesson creating a word cloud; direct students to www.wordle.net and show them some of the created clouds in Wordle gallery for inspiration. Lesson flow: Students are shown how to create their own word clouds and are shown the gallery of already created clouds. Students are given a word group related to a specific topic and are asked to make a list of words they would like to use. Writing, creating a word cloud: After searching the Wordle gallery to gain inspiration, each group of students will start creating their own cloud. They will use the application window to write as many words as they choose to use or they can think of. Some of the words will be written repeatedly in order to have different size of words in the final cloud. Class management: Students will be divided into pairs or groups of three to work on the task. Students will have one week to work on their tasks online. During the week they will share their ideas using social networks, blogs or email. At the end of the week the students will present their printed word clouds to other groups. When all word clouds are presented, the students will vote for the best one.

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The project Autonomous Personal Learning Networks for Language Teachers has been funded with support from the European Commission. This document reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Other issues To practise spelling of particular problematic words the teacher can choose a group of verbs in gerund form, plural nouns or adverbs. Useful tips http://translate.google.com Students might need to translate some words into English or check correct spelling of words www.blogger.com Student can create their own blogs to share their word clouds with friends.

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The project Autonomous Personal Learning Networks for Language Teachers has been funded with support from the European Commission. This document reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.