Curriculum+Connections+&+Ideas



__Introducing the idea of avatars to students: __ Before introducing the concept of an avatar to the kids, I ask each student to share something about himself/herself that most of the class does not know. Last year, my students shared that one girl liked pet rats, one had his own snow cone machine, another's dad was teaching her to surf, etc. After each student shared a tidbit, I asked if a stranger would know who in this class had something to do with a rat? No! Do we (in the class) know which student likes rats? Yes! It seemed to make sense to them now to use a representation, such as a picture of something else, to allow friends to identify them, but not strangers. In come the avatars…

An avatar is a computer user’s representation of himself or herself. We need to be careful when representing ourselves (particularly our students - here's the internet safety lesson window-of-opportunity!) in any form online. We do not want to use a photograph of our students, which might identify them to others based on appearance, as well as sharing approximately how old they are or where they live.

Traditional belief was that students should try to make their avatars as much like themselves as possible. However, as our familiarity with avatars has expanded, educators have expanded our uses for avatars, along with the understanding that our students sometimes also enjoy making avatars that express interests rather than physical similarities to reality.

A student can create an image on the computer using a photograph of him/her self, a drawing he/she has done, clip art, or a digital picture on an object (such as a guitar, a football, a pet, etc.) Most avatar sites allow you to pick a hairstyle, hair color, shape of eyes, eye color, mouth, skin tones, and clothes. Allow your students enough time to explore the sites before they actually create their avatar.

My students adore creating avatars. We created them together in class one day after a lesson on internet safety, the day before we were beginning to work with a class email system. We used my Live Binder folder to look at some options, and then the students had 30 minutes to explore. The expectation was that in 30 minutes, they would have saved an avatar that they were comfortable using to represent their identity online. This was a HUGE hit. And then the next rainy day came along, and my students had to stay inside for recess. A few of them got out Legos or card games, and a contingent of about 15 of them came to me... "Can we make avatars?"





Your students' avatars can be used all year long. Every time your students post something online or you post their work online, use their avatar. Each student could even have their avatar in their own documents folder. When you ask them to print their work they can add their avatar to it. You'll soon recognize each of your students by their avatar.

Students can use their avatars as writing prompts, visuals in emails, and as characters while writing plays. The avatars can be used in Promethean flipcharts or on worksheets, to add visual interest.  Avatars can be used in character studies, by having students write about the avatar based on appearance.  Avatars can be used to label lockers and desks.

And, of course, talking avatars like Voki can do almost ANYTHING! Introduce lessons, give summaries, give report info, speak as a character from a book, advertise an object or destination, etc. The list is almost endless! This is a link to my class wiki that goes with the book The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. My students used Vokis to "become" a character of their choice, speaking the character's implied opinion about the pageant. We them used the embed code to upload them onto our wiki. I changed the wiki's security from "protected" to "open" for this class work time, so that students could upload to the site. Best Christmas Pageant Ever wiki with vokis

<span style="color: #008080; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;">Avatars don't have to be characters that are created online. Avatars can also be photos of your students that are "edited" to make them less identifiable, or images of objects/activities that are important to your student. The images below show a poem-writing activity my class created, with two images layered together - the student's face and the face of an animal. A screenshot of the merged photos would make a good avatar, too!





<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">The Voki blog - part of the Voki site, created by teachers for teachers, created to share ideas for implementation within the curriculum to support standards <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">[|Voki blog]

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">This amazing blog post has two great resources: a list of specific ideas for using avatars in the classroom, and a list of avatar websites. Many of them are on the list on this wiki, but some are not. This blog includes some that are suitable for older secondary (SouthPark characters, etc). <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">[|Digital Tools For Teachers]

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">This site is not only a teacher's blog about the use of avatars, but also has some great links. This has more of a secondary focus! <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 120%;">[|Techntuit]