Flickr search tools

I had the chance to work with a small group of middle school teachers the last two days as they developed teaching activities in geography and history. One of the questions that came up as we were creating placemark descriptions in Google Earth was

Where can I find good images that are copyright free?

It’s a common problem.

There are a variety of tools available online but I always try to start at the Creative Commons section of Flickr. Tons of images that can be used as part of instruction! The problem?

It can be hard to search the database. But I was over at Susan Sedro’s Adventures in Educational Blogging site and ran across one of her recent posts. I now have two new tools!

Compfight

A nice tool that lets you select filter levels for safe searching and creative commons levels. Pretty basic but seems to do a good job with results.

Flickr CC

I like this one because the site displays results on the left and an enlarged version of individual pics to the right. The right side also provides attribution and URL info as well as providing the opportunity to edit the pic with their tool or with Picnik. Very sweet!

Check ‘em out and add them to your multimedia toolkit!

Tip of the Week - I Am poetry

A great way to get kids to emotionally connect with your content is by using something called an “I am” poem.

It allows students to think a bit more about how a particular person might be thinking in very specific ways. Last week I was reminded of the power of the strategy when about 20 of us looked at the images in Toni Morrison’s Remember book. There are lots of templates on line which can help you and your kids organize their thoughts. Simply Google the phrase “I am poem.” You can also find some I Am poem resources here.

I’ve pasted my attempt below. The process is pretty simple. Have your students look at a painting, image or photograph. They should select one person that they will write about and then following the template, fill in the blanks. You could also have every kid write about the same person in the painting or photo. Then have kids exchange papers or read them aloud. It usually works best when reading aloud to not identify the author. (Kids like to here their own voices but perhaps not all want others to know!)

I used a photo from Morrison’s book depicting a father and his son entering a desegregated school for the first time.

I am my son’s father.
I hear our footsteps echoing against the walls around us
I see officials and protestors and my son’s face
I wonder if he will be safe when I am not around? Will the officials protect him as well as I?
I am my son’s father

I pretend to be strong and smart
I feel unsure. Is this the right thing to do?
I hold my son’s and feel his hesitation
I worry that we’re doing the wrong thing
I cry that it’s so hard
I am my son’s father

I understand that we need to do this
I say “Everything is going to be alright. Be strong!”
I dream that some day his son does not have to do this
I try to remember how important this is and
I hope that my son remembers this day when my grandson is born
I am my son’s father

Who’s more radical?

It’s the last day of instruction here at Gilder Lehrman’s elementary summer seminar and I think most of us are dragging a bit. Honi, Bunny and Texas are even slowing down!

But we had another great conversation this morning about the Civil Rights movement and another nice activity planned by Fritz Fischer.

We split into four groups to look at four sets of primary sources and were asked to think of five questions:

• Does the document focus more on the ideals of liberty or equality?
• What does this person think is the method to use to change ideas of race in America?
• Did this person want a radical change? Was this person “anti-American?”
• How does this source relate to the others?
• If you were a HS history teacher, which one document would you use?

What did we look at?

• an audio clip of the first half of King’s I Have a Dream speech
• a series of poems and song lyrics (Paul and Silas, Woke Up This Morning, Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around, Which Shall Overcome)
• the What We Want / What We believe document from Black Panther Party
• a short clip from Malcolm X starring Denzel Washington

An interesting conversation evolved around the question:

Which of these movements was the most radical?

A typical perspective would argue that the Black Panthers and Malcolm X were more radical in their goals and approaches. Fritz suggests that it was actually King’s approach that was the most radical.

Malcolm and the Black Panthers basically wanted the same thing that whites wanted - a separation between whites and blacks.

King’s active non-violent resistance idea was radically different.

Human nature seems to be that a proper response to violence is more violence. His idea of turning the other cheek was very radical, difficult and “not natural” according to Malcom X. White kids going to school with black kids was a radical idea and was very different than the Black Panthers who argued for separate black communities.

This led to far more difficult questions. Who’s ideas were best for America? What America are we trying to create? To preserve? What impact have these movements had on the America of 2008? What sorts of movements are needed today?

Pretty sure that I don’t have the answers to those questions. One of the themes this week has been the concept of complexity in American history. Race and race relations are much more complex than we think and there are no simple answers.

But I love the process Fritz created of using primary sources to encourage high levels of thinking. My brain is now wrapping around the whole idea of how I could adapt this process with other topics.

Google Docs adds templates

In an earlier post I suggested that Google Earth was like the Swiss Army knife of 21st century tools. If GE is the Swiss Army knife, Google Docs has to be at least a screwdriver.

It’s always been a handy gadget and Google has always worked to improve the product.

And now the Google Docs people have done it again by adding templates to the tool. Get a sense of the types of the over 300 templates by checking out the gallery.

It’s pretty simple to use the templates. Simply click on New while logged into Google Docs and on the drop-down menu, select From template.

Handy stuff!

Nature. Would you like people with that?

Fritz hiked us up into the Flatirons west of Boulder this afternoon to talk about environmental history.

Nice idea. The concept that where you live impacts how you think and act is one that has been around for a while. But getting up a couple of miles into the foothills provided a great venue for talking about how we view nature and how that view can impact current events.

Long story short?

Fritz had us do two activities. The first on the way up the mountain (can the Flatirons / foothills be called mountains?) and the second once we arrived at a shelter along the trail.

During the first activity, he asked us to be quiet and listen to nature. What did we hear? Answers were varied but similar. Wind. Grass brushing against itself. Birds.

But not until we were prompted did we realize that we also heard footsteps of others on the trail and, far off in the distance, ambient noise from Boulder.

Hold that thought.

Later, during the second activity, he asked us to draw nature. It could be anything. After a few minutes, we passed our exceptional artwork around. Fritz asked us to note what we saw. Again, varied responses but similar. Trees. Animals. FIsh. Water. Mountains. Sun. Grass. Rocks.

Then he asked:

How many people did you see in your drawings?

Just one.

The point? When we think of nature, we think of nature devoid of humans. People have always been part of nature but we’ve constructed an artificial view of nature that doesn’t include us.

We went on to discuss a ton of stuff including some nice conversation about the difference between “conservation” and “preservation.” The ton of stuff is important and it does impact policy today. In ANWR, for example.

But as an educator, I just love the way Fritz used the two activities to hook us into the content and provide an entry point to discussion. Nice stuff!

I need to find a way to adapt this to a GPS activity I’m doing with MS teachers next week. How could you adapt it?