Haiku Deck is a web-based and iOS tool that makes it easy to create visually stunning presentations, and it is free. While you can upload and use your own photos, Haiku Deck has a huge library of Creative Commons photos for you to use, and it has a great search feature that uses the words of your text to suggest photos.
Here is an example of how easy it is to find great pictures. Haiku Deck has automatically suggested words to use to search images from the words I entered on the slide. It chose the words valentine, day, holiday, sweets, sweetie, and holiday sweets.
I've selected to use the word "sweets" by clicking on it, and Haiku Deck has returned a number of images. I can always go back to choose a different word to search on, or enter a different word for those on the slide altogether.
The text feature encourages the creator to limit his/her words. This will help teach your students to be precise, and may even build public speaking skills when they don't have lines of text to read when presenting to their class.Want to use Haiku Deck for math? No problem. There are also graph templates to use.
Haiku Deck offers suggestions to teachers on creating an account for their class here:
Haiku Deck Accounts: Best Practices in the Classroom - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires
There are lots of ways to integrate Haiku Deck into your curriculum. Leslie Abbott, a second grade teacher at Guadalupe, recently shared, "In my enrichment RTI group we read about cheetah adaptations in a National Geographic for KIDS, made a thinking map/tree map, and now on Monday I'll have them make the Haiku Deck on their chrome books." This is the one she made as an example.
Here are a few more ideas to get you started using Haiku Deck in your classroom:
- illustrate vocabulary
- tell a story
- holiday messages
- illustrate poems
- examples of a concept
If you are using Haiku Deck in your classroom, please e-mail me your ideas and I'll happily pass them on.
If you or one of your colleagues are doing something in your class that uses edtech tools, please let me know. I'd love to share it with other teachers.
