"The Early Bird gets the Wordle"

Wordle!

What is Wordle?
Wordle is a free tool for creating word clouds from texts of your choosing or your own mind that is simple to use. The clouds that you create show how prevalent a word is within a text. When you insert text from a chapter about water in your science book, Wordle would put the most frequently used words, such as "Water," from that chapter in a larger print in comparison to lesser used words. You also have the luxury of customizing the size, shape, orientation, and color of the generated Wordle. The only exception when entering text is that you need to leave out all punctuation, it isn't needed. Here's an example of the Create screen:

Who can use Wordle?
Wordle can be used by anyone with access to the internet!

When or how could you, as the science teacher, use Wordle?

Uses for Wordle:

• Generate a Wordle for students to use at the beginning or end of a unit
• When students need a visual representation of the content you are teaching, you as the teacher can create a Wordle to help 
• Your students can use Wordle to summarize qualitative data or their readings
• You, as the teacher,can use Wordle as a supplement to a lesson
• Wordle can be used to present vocabulary in a fun and engaging manner by your students or yourself
• Students can use Wordle as a means of review before a test
• As an entrance/exit slip: Specifically, you could have your class create a Wordle that contains information about what they learned,questions they had, or any other comment and have them upload them to the class website as a virtual "permission slip" that shows they participated that day
• Teachers can assign a Wordle as a response to a reading/chapter
• As a bulletin board filler: Students can generate a Wordle about what they think about a topic(ie: What is Science?)and post them onto a bulletin board outside of the classroom
• Students can also use Wordle as a means of reflection

Where can I find additional Wordles?
http://www.wordle.net/

A couple of examples...

What does this Wordle represent?

This Wordle (taken from the website itself) shows words that go along with a Biology unit. The most frequently used terms are Biology, Organisms, Cells, Species, and DNA for example. Other words that are used less often may or may not be equally important as these so it's important to remember to prioritize what words you insert to create a Wordle.

Could I use Wordle to help students understand Common Core, NGSS, or NCES?

Sure! I've included a Wordle that uses terminology from the 6th grade NC Essential Science Standard 6.P.1 and its clarifying objectives 6.P.1.1 through 6.P.1.3. This standard says:

Essential Standard Clarifying Objectives 

6.P.1 Understand the properties of waves and the wavelike property of energy in earthquakes, light and sound waves.6.P.1.1 Compare the properties of waves to the wavelike property of energy in earthquakes, light and sound. 6.P.1.2 Explain the relationship among visible light, the electromagnetic spectrum, and sight. 6.P.1.3 Explain the relationship among the rate of vibration, the medium through which vibrations travel, sound and hearing.

Put into the Wordle Create Tab, it comes out looking something similar to the following Wordle:

The possibilities are endless with Wordle! Go online and try it out for yourself!