New Tools
- Tools to generate word clouds
Wordle
"Wordle" is a tool which can be used to generate word clouds from any given text. Different fonts, layouts and colors can be chosen, words that appear more frequently in the text are highlited. The word clouds can be printed or saved (gallery).
Here you can see a word cloud about the poem "The Tiger" (William Blake) which was generated with Wordle:
Tagul & Tagxedo
"Tagul" and "Tagxedo" are also word cloud generator tools. Here, too, several fonts and colors can be chosen. What is different from "Wordle" is that the text can be arranged in various shapes (e.g. Heart-, Rectangle-Shape). The word clouds that have been created, can also be saved (gallery).
Again a word cloud...this time generated with Tagul:
appearance: pentagram
font: Duality Regular
http://tagul.com
(for Tagxedo - visit: http://www.tagxedo.com)
How could the tools be used in class ?
- as part of an introduction
- to create posters
- for special topics (cities, countries)
- for lessons dealing with poetry (to put a poem in the right order)
- Other tools
Delicious
"Delicious" is a tool which can be used to save favorite links (e.g. by adding a Delicious bookmarklet to the browser toolbar), collect discoveries in stacks (i.e. a collection of links build around a common theme) and share topics with other people.
http://www.delicious.com
How could it be used?
Teachers could use the tool to create a collection of links which they frequently use e.g. for preparing lessons. They could also share their findings with colleagues.
Netvibes
"Netvibes" is a dashboard publishing platform. One single account consists of a public dahboard and several private dashboards.
A dashboard is a dynamic workspace where you can add modules called "Apps" (i.e. small applications that provide specific info).
http://www.netvibes.com