- Make Beliefs Comix: the user can only make 3-strip comics. So I thought to myself, "well, this is annoying. But! I'll just make several strips and put them together on my blog" WRONG! I spent about 30 minutes on my first strip, went to save, and then the file failed and couldn't be opened on any other medium.
- Comic Master: At first, this sight looked very useful. There were numerous buttons and ways to edit your comic. However, there were not many options at all! There were four "super hero looking" characters to choose from, six backgrounds, etc. Nothing fit into what I was trying to get across through my comic. It was extremely narrow and not helpful for educational purposes.
- Witty Comics: Once again, you could only create 3-strip comics with very, very few characters, backgrounds, and enhancement objects to choose from. This site was not fit this assignment, at all!
So, I ended up using Chogger, a browser based application. This site was the most useful because of the wide variety of options that were available when creating a comic. Through this website, you can have up to EIGHT boxes in your comic strip. Way more than other online comic-making site that I've looked into. My favorite option was being to upload your own pictures, characters, objects, and backgrounds to each box by searching google through their site or uploading from your computer documents. FINALLY A SITE WITH CUSTOMIZATION OPTIONS!! Each image can be edited with erasers, drawing tools, shapes, or blurring. Adding captions are awesome too, because you can have a thought, speech, caption, text, or meme. The options are endless. And everything can be personalized with color, font, or size.
This tool would actually be useful in integrating art experiences in your classroom. Comics are a fun, easy-to-read addition to any lesson. By combining pictures, color, and expressions and adding educational information, comics could reinforce or introduce any topic because it catches the students attention.
Potentially, older students could use this site to create their own digital artifact. However, I would not want them too! This comic literally took me FOUR HOURS to create. It was way to intense of a project for the little information gained out of it, when the students create it. I would much rather have my students do something kinesthetic or create a craft project to learn and present their information. Comics are just too short of an area to relay ideas, take too long to create, and I believe there are better, more creative, and aesthetically appealing ways to grab a students attention. Plus, there were several things that I did not like about the site. First thing being, you had to create an account in order for your comic to be saved on the site. And once its saved anyone can access it, so there is potential for students to steal another persons work or have theirs stolen. It's easy to cheat. And secondly, if you choose not to make an account, your comic cannot be saved to your computer. So after my four hours of work, I couldn't even share it to my blog. Luckily, they did give me a URL to go to for access.
What made this site easy:
- The buttons and editing tools were self-explanatory and easy to use
- customizable for personal/educational purposes
- do not need an account (although, it is recommended)
Challenges:
- work cannot actually be saved off the site
- there were several times where I logged on to edit my comic and the site was down and nothing was working - extremely unreliable for students especially
http://cho.gr/g5fIf
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