Photovoice Powerpoint Project

Photovoice is designed to be a Powerpoint presentation and personal narrative. I find that when the kids can take a large project and take each section through the writing process, essentially publishing or making a final draft in pieces, it works better. This project is no different. The kids think this project is exciting, and it aligns well with the common core standards, including technology.

Photovoice was first introduced to me during my masters program at Ashland, and I have adapted it to use in the classroom. It gives the kids an opportunity to write about themselves (which they love doing) and learn some good writing skills on how to make a Powerpoint as well as how to write a personal narrative. When it is divided into sections that they can complete independently, it seems like a less daunting task to them rather than trying to complete the whole thing at one time.

I think that it’s important not to give intermediate kids any more than 8 subtopics in any writing project. And then those subtopics are small, consisting, in this case, of only a paragraph. Here are the sections that I used for the Photovoice: introduction, where/when you were born or birthday, your favorite place, school, family, hobbies, favorite toy, home, and pets. I also have a section for work at the end, but the kids don’t really have a job, so we’ll skip that. You can adapt your subtopics any way you see fit. Writing about "favorites" is very popular. For each section, the kids take a picture of an object to symbolize that topic (you’ll have to have a discussion on symbolism with them), and then they write about it.

If you want to take the project further, the kids can make the Powerpoints into movies by saving it as a .PNG file. (Click “save as,” “other formats,” and in the save as type drop down menu click “PNG Portable Network Graphics Format.” Then they can open it up in Windows Movie Maker and add music, narration, and such. Just “Google” for a more detailed summary on how to do that.)

If access to technology is an issue for you, you can also do a paper version, which I have done. For my project, I had the kids make accordion books with pockets (take a 12” x 18” piece of construction paper, fold a long side up about 2 inches, and accordion fold it into 8 sections. Use a couple of staples to hold the fold in place if you need to.). The kids glued the photos on the fronts of the pockets and then put the writing onto little tags to insert into the pockets. (Making a Powerpoint is actually probably a little easier because you don't have to resize the photos and print them out. An alternative might be to have the kids bring in objects that they can glue right to the pockets without taking a pic or draw pictures of the objects. They might not, however, enjoy or be receptive to taking away the actual use of photographs.) They used a lot of art to decorate the pieces and some scrapbook embellishing ideas. This works well, too. It’s a lot more exciting than your plain old paper project or even paper with a decorative border.

You Won't Find Brown Crayons in My Room

Every year, without a doubt, I have the following conversation in my room.

Student: Mrs. Jayne, what’s your favorite color?

 Me: Brown.

 Student: Brown’s not a color. Seriously, what’s your favorite color?

 Me: Brown.

(By this time, they either realize that brown is a color, or I tell them to go back to their seat and look in their crayon box. Sure enough, brown is there.)

Student: Okay…Why do you like brown?

(Perhaps they can get me here…)

Me: Because it is the color of all the things I love: coffee, chocolate, trees, peanut butter…

 Student: Oh…okay. (Makes sense.)

Then they go “skip-to-my-Lou” back to their seats and start drawing. Soon, everyone knows the teacher’s favorite color is brown, and everything they make is that color. What I don’t tell them is that brown is also my favorite color because it gets them thinking. They ask questions: Is that your favorite shirt because it’s brown? Is your dog brown? Do you like brown because that’s the color of your eyes? Should I color the background brown so the teacher will read it and like it?

By the end of the year, my room is filled with brown drawings: coffee, pictures of me and them holding hands (with brown hair even though they are blonde!), dogs, birds, signs, etc…The brown crayons have the paper peeled off or don’t exist, markers are dry (this is when I wish markers were sold in separate colors), and writings have brown borders all over them.

I look at all the things they’ve made throughout the year and smile, or cry, because they made them for me. I am their audience.

I love teaching!

Hallway Mini-Posters

Here’s one summer project down…If you think about it, the kids spend a lot of time in the hall. They switch classes, go to lunch, go to specials, go to the library, go to the bathroom, go to the office (for good things, of course), etc. We all put kids’ projects up on the bulletin boards in the hallways for others to see the amazing things we are doing in our classroom. But…do the kids really have time to read them? Maybe they stop to read one or two per month on their way to and from the bathroom, but then they risk the chance of getting in trouble because they took too long. (We should stop and think about why they took a long time, by the way. Maybe they WERE reading something on a bulletin board.)

Any whooo…If you stopped and looked at my Pinterest site, you would know that I love inspirational quotes, and I am always looking for ways to share them! I thought…"Why not share these with the school?" So, I created some mini-posters of inspirational quotes with Power Point to hang from the drop ceilings in the hallway. The good thing about them is that they are short and sweet. Kids and adults alike will be able to read them as they walk from one room to another. Hopefully they’ll put little skips in their steps and smiles on their faces. =)

Click here if you want to print the posters!

 

Writing Is Visual

When we walk into a bookstore to select a new book to read, one of the first things we do is look at the cover. IF the cover LOOKS enticing, we might take the time to pick the book up off the shelf and take a quick flip through the pages. IF the pages LOOK decent, THEN we might read the blurb. Visual presentation is a KEY to good writing.

So, one of the things that I teach my kids is that the writing they create throughout the year needs to be visually appealing. I tell them, “No one is going to stop and read what you wrote, if they do not think it LOOKS good.” I also tell them, “The main purpose of WRITING is READING. People write so that others will read it.” These statements help to get students to really appreciate neatness in their handwriting and visual presentation. No more paperwork is turned in to me on half sheets of paper nor homework with last night's dinner on it. It also gets them to connect reading and writing and understand that they go hand in hand: Readers are Writers, and Writers are Readers. Here’s a simple, but perfect example of two title pages for the same book side by side. Which one are you going to pick up and read?

 I find that getting kids to pay attention to what their writing looks like helps to motivate them as writers. A lot of kids appeal to their visual senses, and this is a way to get them to do it in their writing. We spend a lot of time looking at different book covers and discussing what works and what doesn't. We also compare different covers of the same book. Then the kids take what they have learned and apply it to their own published pieces.