Cool Tools: Innovative Technology
Befunky.com
The innovative tool that I chose to work with is a website called befunky.com. It is a free website where you can upload photos and edit them with a large variety of image editing techniques. When you first go to the website, click on a button that says “Get Started.” After doing so a box will appear on your screen asking where the photo is that you want to upload. You can even connect to Facebook to use pictures from your account.
Once you upload your picture there are a number of tools you can use that are listed on the left side of the screen. You can add a frame to your picture, speech bubbles, clip art, text, and you can also alter the colors. There are two sections that are especially fun to work with. One is called “Artsy” and the other is called “Effects.” They allow you to change the type of colors and texture of the picture. For example, in the Effects section you can change your picture to a cartoon version, or a watercolor version if you want. There is a large amount of free clip art and effects options but you can pay to get more if you want. One negative thing I noticed about it was that after you apply a change to your picture it is not able to be edited again. I had to start over on one of my pictures that I worked on.
This kind of picture editing website is great because it is free and easily accessible. As long as you can get online you can use this tool. It is also fairly easy to use. Things are pretty straight forward. The drag and drop method is used for clip art and you can re-size just about everything. This tool would work better with younger kids because as people get older they want more advanced programs like Photoshop and other special editing programs. I plan to teach Pre-K-3rd grade so this would be a wonderful program to have the students use to do a project. For example, if you wanted to have your kids each pick out a specific moral, like treat others the way you wish to be treated, and make a comic book story to show what that moral is about. The student could take pictures and edit them to add cartoon and comic effects. This would be a great way to creatively teach a child about morals. It could also be used in a simpler context for little kids. They could pick a picture to edit and make it into a scene. You could assign each child an emotion and have them edit a picture that describes that emotion. You could also have the kids work in groups and edit a series of pictures to make a story. There are many ways this tool can be creatively utilized in the classroom.
One downside to this image editing tool is that the options are pretty basic. The clip art is not anything special. Though, the editing may be basic, it still has a lot of options to get many points across. I made another picture that was supposed to represent the season winter. I made it to show that you could easily have the kids edit pictures to represent the seasons, or types of weather. Even with this downside, it can still be effectively used in the classroom.
This image editing tool supports the framework for 21st century teaching and learning because it is more than just taking a picture. It is changing the colors and adding words, effects and other creative elements to the picture. It is using the computer to expand the mind and let out creativity. It is important for kids to learn how to use computers now they are so commonly used so tools like befunky.com are very useful for little lesson plan ideas. Not only are the kids creatively altering pictures to match their imagination but they are also learning how to use the computer. I am going to attach the pictures I edited using befunky.com to show some of the things you can do with it.
Once you upload your picture there are a number of tools you can use that are listed on the left side of the screen. You can add a frame to your picture, speech bubbles, clip art, text, and you can also alter the colors. There are two sections that are especially fun to work with. One is called “Artsy” and the other is called “Effects.” They allow you to change the type of colors and texture of the picture. For example, in the Effects section you can change your picture to a cartoon version, or a watercolor version if you want. There is a large amount of free clip art and effects options but you can pay to get more if you want. One negative thing I noticed about it was that after you apply a change to your picture it is not able to be edited again. I had to start over on one of my pictures that I worked on.
This kind of picture editing website is great because it is free and easily accessible. As long as you can get online you can use this tool. It is also fairly easy to use. Things are pretty straight forward. The drag and drop method is used for clip art and you can re-size just about everything. This tool would work better with younger kids because as people get older they want more advanced programs like Photoshop and other special editing programs. I plan to teach Pre-K-3rd grade so this would be a wonderful program to have the students use to do a project. For example, if you wanted to have your kids each pick out a specific moral, like treat others the way you wish to be treated, and make a comic book story to show what that moral is about. The student could take pictures and edit them to add cartoon and comic effects. This would be a great way to creatively teach a child about morals. It could also be used in a simpler context for little kids. They could pick a picture to edit and make it into a scene. You could assign each child an emotion and have them edit a picture that describes that emotion. You could also have the kids work in groups and edit a series of pictures to make a story. There are many ways this tool can be creatively utilized in the classroom.
One downside to this image editing tool is that the options are pretty basic. The clip art is not anything special. Though, the editing may be basic, it still has a lot of options to get many points across. I made another picture that was supposed to represent the season winter. I made it to show that you could easily have the kids edit pictures to represent the seasons, or types of weather. Even with this downside, it can still be effectively used in the classroom.
This image editing tool supports the framework for 21st century teaching and learning because it is more than just taking a picture. It is changing the colors and adding words, effects and other creative elements to the picture. It is using the computer to expand the mind and let out creativity. It is important for kids to learn how to use computers now they are so commonly used so tools like befunky.com are very useful for little lesson plan ideas. Not only are the kids creatively altering pictures to match their imagination but they are also learning how to use the computer. I am going to attach the pictures I edited using befunky.com to show some of the things you can do with it.
This is the first picture I edited. I took a picture from my Facebook page and added some words and filters and made it look like a comic book scene. I was thinking a fun assignment for a class to do would be to have the kids get in groups and edit a few pictures in a comic book format and create a story. It could be a story they make up or it could pertain to a book they read.
This is the second picture I edited. Again, I found a picture from my Facebook and used the clip art and filters to make the picture of my mom’s cat look like a winter/Christmas themed picture. A good idea for younger kids would be having them pick a season or holiday and edit a picture to represent said season or holiday.