Great Lesson Starter for any subject using Flickr

I mentioned this excellent lesson starter in my recent TESS Article and have shown it to loads of teachers around the country over the past few months. It is non-subject specific, its quick, has huge impact and provides and excellent context for discussion.

In order for it to work you need reasonable Internet access, a data projector, access to flickr and a willingness to take a risk. The risk, in my opinion, is not that great – you just have to be prepared not to pre-moderate the flickr images. If anything inappropriate comes I just make this part of the learning.

Here is how it works:

1. Go to flickr – www.flickr.com

2. In the search box type in what your lesson is about or what you want to generate discussion about (eg: triangles, Roald Dahl, cakes, glaciers, hockey, world war two, chemicals, Vincent  VanGogh etc…). Click on search.

3. Flickr returns hundreds of user generated photos / content. You can have a quick scan through to see if you think it is appropriate content or not.

4. Then click on slideshow.

5. Flickr turns all the photographs into a slide show that you can show as the class is coming in, to introduce a topic or to generate discussion.

6. There are no copyright issues as all you are doing is technically browsing the flickr website – the users of the site want you to see their photos!

The below video shows me generating a lesson starter for a lesson on glaciers. As you will see from the video it hardly takes any time at all.

Comments

[Tom]

Simple and powerful is always the best way! I wondered if you have ever used Befuddlr http://befuddlr.com as a way to extend the simple use of Flickr. It takes the image and makes a simple puzzle out of it. Great to use on a particular image that is indicative of the work in the lesson or as a plenary in a session. I used it on a diagram of the water cycle. http://tbarrett.edublogs.org/?s=befuddlr

[David Rogers]

Great simple idea Ollie. Used this today when looking at Niagara Falls to generate enquiry questions about the area.

David

[OllieBray]

Hi Tom - good to hear from you. I've not used befuddlr - but I'll check it out!

Hows it going Dave - glad you like the idea and that you have made some use of it.

See you both soon.

Ollie

[Nick]

A way round the 'online safety' issue is to use your own account. I have used flickr for a few years personally and sign in at work to my flickr account then use the search but it limits to appropriate images.

[Rich]

A great idea. Have you looked at:

http://taggalaxy.de/

can return some interesting searches, extending your basic search.

[fearghal]

Nice idea

I used it today with 'conformity' in Higher Psychology.

Very interesting...

[Victoria Ellis]

Did this with Svalbard with an "interesting" Yr8 group yesterday - worked a treat! So simple but so effective.