Thing #6: Mashups and 3rd Party Sites

Well, I tried visiting several of the sites mentioned on the Library2play blog. I visited Mappr and enjoyed playing with Splatter but had trouble with Tile Drawer. I did not understand the instructions - they looked very technical and complicated. So I switched to Flickr Color Pickr and viewed the color wheel with Flickr Central and all the photos from the central pool. There did not seem to be a connection to Creative Commons photos.

I liked Bookr, but was a little confused on how I would create a book with photos from Creative Commons. Maybe I missed some instruction somewhere - how do you pick the photos and give credit as you make the book? Mosaic Maker looked like fun - you had to link your Flickr account and again, I could not figure out how to credit the pictures so I did not finish the book.

I visited the Librarian Trading Cards and was surprised to find few recent posts. But I really like the idea of trading cards so I visited Trading Card Maker and made the card you see at left. I avoided the credit/citing issue by using one of my own. I really like the idea that the students can make something in a relatively short period of time and show what they have learned. If reviewing a book, they can put the title and author and 3 to 4 points to list in the description: character, brief plot, likes, dislikes, overall rating, etc. As they master this and other 2.0 skills they can put them together in a slide show or podcast to show the books they have read or states they have researched, or people they have studied, etc.

I also took a look at some of the other products available on BigHugheLabs. They have lots of great stuff - I used another picture from my trip to make this motivational poster. And they have a place to credit the photo when making a poster!