Images

[|Animoto] - Choose pictures and music and let animoto mix it for you! Aviary - Creation tool for pictures, music, and videos - [|http://aviary.com] Comiques - Create and alter images and add captions - [] Fotobabble - Create talking photos to tell your story - [] Photo Editor Online - Edit photots online - [] [|PhotoStory3] - Create your own slideshow using a free download for MS Window users. Smilebox - Write about pictures or videos personally taken - [] Voice Thread - Add voice to images - []

**Tips and Tricks

**  **Keep It Simple: ** > > >  
 * You can take the pictures for students to add to, manipulate, etc.
 * I f you are short on time let the students take the pictures, then you can place them into PowerPoint (or other programs) and have the students add any necessary captions, etc.
 * Not enough photos to finish the presentation? Use clip art, Flickr and Google images. The students like seeing their work mixed in with “real” photos and __love__ clipart.  When you use copyrighted items use it as an opportunity to practice copyright awareness*. You can even find pictures on the web and e-mail the author for permission to use it in a class project.
 * Activities can be done with print-outs or on computers. There is nothing wrong with using paper and glue with your photos. The actual physical manipulation is a big plus for some students.
 * Sometimes taking the picture is enough. The focus required to select and photograph an object fitting the assigned category does the job 
 * Try limiting the number of pictures each student can take. This forces them to be more discerning about what they photograph. 
 * Scanners can be used to create collages that illustrate many of the same topics as these activities. 
 * Sound can be easily added to most presentations using a cheap microphone and recording software that comes on every computer. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Sometimes you only need to take the pictures to teach the topic. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Keep blank PowerPoint templates with varying numbers of slides and levels of difficulty available for when you are in a hurry.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Have a collection of various pictures of your students. Take full body and head shots of various sizes ahead of time. Most school photographers provide a CD containing all of the fall school pictures. Keep some of these pictures around at all times. Use full page labels as contact sheets for easy adhesion.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Take a camera every time you go to recess and build a stock photo library.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Appoint class photographers each month to capture classroom activities for future use in newsletters, web pages, year-end collections, etc.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Train your students to complete sections of the process. Have a photographer, printer, author, etc.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Take pictures of each step in any procedure you want students to follow and number them. This is especially helpful in learning centers and during experiments since they allow students to see what they need to do.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Going on a Field Trip? Show students photos of important sites ahead of time to help them focus. You can use the same photos to review after the trip.
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Try and take pictures for several projects at the same time. (ex. Fraction Set pictures and Numbers Book pictures) Split the students into groups. While one group is setting up the next can be taking pictures, etc. This makes it easier with only one camera. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Have more than one grade do parts of the same project. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">You don’t even really need a digital camera. You can s <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">can existing prints and create a CD or request a CD when you have your film developed. This way you’ll have access to all the benefits digital photography offers. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Ask your friends, church or service group members to donate <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">older model digital still and video cameras and memory cards they outgrew when they upgraded
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">When you are training young students on how to use cameras give them old cameras to play with. It doesn’t even matter if the cameras work. You just want the students to get some practice looking through viewfinders and pushing buttons, zooming and checking for fingers in front of the lens. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Always have extra charged batteries, floppy disks and/or memory cards. Our oldest Sony Mavica came with a separate charger which comes in really handy. Check around your school to see if you have one.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Train the students on how to use the cameras in very small groups. It is helpful to let them take pictures and then go over them together as a large group to discuss which shots are the best and why.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Use cameras with straps and insist the students let them hang around their necks so that will be safe from dropping.
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">You can adjust cameras to take smaller, but still great pictures so that you have plenty of memory on trips. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Use small containers (min-muffin pan, small paint palette) to keep the items the students are working with from rolling around. These are also helpful when working on grouping and fractional relationships. <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">With younger students it is best to create a template for the actual project. Save copies in several places on a network drive for when someone invariably saves their blank page on top of the template.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">If you are using several cameras it is helpful to keep small envelopes handy so the students can write their names on the envelopes and seal the memory card inside. This avoids confusion about who took which picture.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">We raise money for printer ink by selling CD’s with slideshows of the photos the students have taken all year.