Students can use this online writing tool to develop their creative writing skills and understanding of literacy elements. When a teacher sets up a Boom Writer account, s/he then creates accounts for his/her students as well. The teacher can choose from 3 different activities - Story Writer, Word Writer, and Project writer. The activity presented on Tuesday was the Story Writer. The first step is to present a writing prompt to the class. A teacher can create his/her own or use the multitude of examples available on the website. Then, students write a response to their teacher's prompt using the Boomwriter website. Once all prompts are submitted, the class will choose which response is the best; this will be chapter one of their class story. Next, the students use the winning response as a catapult to write the next chapter of the story and submit it via the Boomwriter website. Another winner is chosen and the process continues until the story is completed. When voting, the students are not able to see the name of the author, making the decision process more authentic.
Teachers will sign up on the Storybird website and provide their students with a class code. When I had 5th graders sign up for accounts, I had them use their district provided username and password to keep things simple. Once in your class account, students will choose a set of drawings from the website. These drawings were created by artists. There is a plethora of options available, so it may take students time to decide on the set they would like to use.
Once a set is chosen, students are taken to a the builder area of the website where they can drag and drop the pictures onto a page.
This is also where they add text and dialogue. The challenge for the students to write a story utilizing the pictures as guide. The text should make sense with the pictures on the page. The end result is an online book with beautiful pictures and a story crafted by the student. Teachers can also order their student's books for $2.99 each.
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