“You mean they didn’t really go there?” a student asked me.
She was pointing to a bulletin board of Photo Mapo projects by my 1st graders. Each student had chosen a Google Street View image of a landmark in the country they were studying. Using the Green Screen app by DoInk, the students inserted pictures of themselves in front of the landmarks. They also took video of themselves explaining the landmarks. The pictures were inserted into Photo Mapo, linked to their videos on Aurasma, and presto – interactive postcards.
Several of my grade levels have taken advantage of the Green Screen app we purchased this year. My 2nd graders used it to portray themselves in front of famous bridges around the world, and one chose to use it to make a video about her biomimetic invention.
In yesterday’s post, I showed how word clouds can be fun with the Green Screen app (thanks to Tricia Fuglestad for the idea).
Tricia also gave me the idea for the Time Magazine covers my 5th graders worked on last week. Here is a link to her post about this project. For our own versions, my students used Green Screen by DoInk and Canva.
Some of my students have become so familiar with using the screen that they automatically turn it around to the blue side if a student is wearing green so he or she won’t appear as a disembodied head.
If you want some more green screen ideas, I highly recommend you do a search on Tricia’s Fugleblog. Don’t have the ability to buy apps? Touchcast is free, though not quite as user friendly for younger students. No green screen in your classroom? There are tons of instructions for makeshift screens on the web, including pizza boxes, science boards, sheets, and paint.
Let your students travel to any continent, planet, or even the future with a green screen.
