How Can I Use Tagul in My Classroom?

•        How Can I Use Tagul in My Classroom?
  ·        Examine famous speeches. Ask student to predict what they will see in the word cloud. What themes appear? How does the word cloud fit in with the historical context of the document?
  ·        Create graphics to accompany student report or personal narratives.
  ·        Analyze a current affairs news story. What could the story have been about? Can you guess what the headline would have been? Where could have it taken place?
  ·        Reflect on student writing samples. By copying and pasting their own writing sample into a Tagul, students can see what words they are repeatedly using. Then, they can expand their vocabulary by using a dictionary and thesaurus to avoid redundant writing.
  ·        Map out vocabulary words. Create clouds for specific units of vocabulary. Link each word to its definition. This can be a great study tool for students to use to quiz themselves, too.
  ·        Use a cloud as a pre-learning activity for a new book study. For example, copy and paste the first chapter of a book. Use this cloud to explore initial ideas about the book’s theme.
  ·        Create a word cloud using the index from a new unit of study to begin a discussion and activate students’ prior knowledge on this new topic.
  ·        Students can use a cloud as a self-assessment tool. Type in words they know about a topic before starting a unit. Repeat this activity at the end of the unit to see how much they learned.
  ·        Enter your students’ names into a cloud to give you a graphical representation of your class.
  ·        Classroom polls: Instead of your traditional bar graph, use a word cloud to display your data. What is the favorite color in your class? Have all students take turns at entering their favorite color into Tagul and generate a cloud. The bigger words will be the more popular colors.
  ·        Compare and contrast the word clouds of two or more students’ writing, famous speeches, lyrics, news reports, book reviews or anything you need to compare in your classroom.
  ·        Student profiles: Have all students anonymously write positive adjectives about each of their classmates. Compile all the papers, input the adjectives for each student into Tagul, and generate a unique word cloud to give back to each student. Children always enjoy positive feedback, and it can be a great end-of-year activity to take home from the last day of school.
  ·        Brighten up word walls. Brainstorm synonyms, antonyms, or definitions.
  ·        Introduce a topic: Students can guess what they will be learning about from a keyword cloud.
  ·        Compare news sources: Look at the same story in two or more different newspapers or news websites. Compare the word clouds. How do the words used differ?
  ·        Encourage creative writing: Give students a word cloud with a selection of key words. Use this as a writing prompt.