Microsoft's AutoCollage

I love all the Microsoft programmes that are free to teachers who join the Partners in Learning website. One of my favourites is AutoCollage. Have you tried it?  This is one really great way of capturing all the students in your class in various activities during the school year.

How does AutoCollage work?

1. Put the photos that you want to use in a folder in My Pictures
When you open AutoCollage you’ll see that it picks up all the folders of photos in My Pictures. Choose the folder you want and immediately all the pictures in the folder will appear in the middle.

2. Click on Create
AutoCollage starts to swirl the pictures around. This is where you make some choices in the settings. Do you want some to be bigger than others, for example?

3. Your picture starts to take shape

4. What’s the verdict?

If you don’t like the resulting picture just click on Create a again and a different arrangement appears.

Classroom ideas for Autocollage

1. Create a picture to put on a classroom door that incorporates everyone

2. Use it as a way of capturing everyone’s finished work or to remember names!

3. Use it to collect memories from a project. (This is from Lisa Gair’s Adopt-a-donkey project)

4. Use it for collecting themes about South Africa and writing poems about the theme as was done by the class of 8 year olds at St John’s College in Johannesburg.

5. Use it in Maths for collecting pictures of Shapes

6. Other ideas that could work

• Make a card from the class for some occasion
• Creative writing exercises – ‘How does this make you feel?’ ‘Moods and feelings’
• Book cover for a planning book
• Create a vocabulary exercise using PowerPoint and store it on a blog
• Create certificates
• A collage of a novel’s characters
• Background for a PowerPoint presentation
• A record of a lesson with everyone showing their product

7. Microsoft has plenty of step by step instruction available on their website

A video from UK Partners in Learning ‘How to use Autocollage’

http://youtu.be/1GAUW0wRd4A