Learning
Quest Course Website |
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| 2005 Theme | 2005 Theme Resources | 2005 Topic Design Worksheet | Pathfinder Template | 2008 Course Paperwork | ||
By using Inspiration to generate ideas, organize information, and prioritise information, students can work in a visual environment, tapping visual modes of learning to develop critical thinking skills, develop organization skills, and deepen their understanding of the concepts they're working with.
Inspiration examples
1. Jane & Charlotte.
This is a compare & contrast diagram.
2. Character Web: Stuart
Little - It maps out the key characteristics of Stuart Little.
3. Our third example of visual learning techniques is webbing. This example
shows how a class or student used webbing to explore the various forms
of water.
4. Concept mapping: Sound
A concept map is a specific kind of graphical organizer. It tackles a
difficult concept and links related concepts with words to describe their
relationships, showing you how the concepts and ideas interrelate. Concept
mapping helps students learn new information by having them integrate
each new idea into their existing body of knowledge.
5. Planning: Plants
Web Site Design
Finally, Inspiration is used for a whole variety of planning activities,
including teacher planning and multimedia planning. This example shows
how Inspiration can be used by students to plan out a web site before
they create it. Each of the symbols represents one of the pages they'll
create; the links show the paths of navigation throughout the site. You'll
notice a new feature in Inspiration 6 - hyperlinking! A click on this
symbol - Plant Life Cycle - would take us to www.conceptmapping.com where
we could learn more about creating a concept map.
Inspiration Demo
1. Click the File menu and select New. Click
File and New.
Along the top of the window is the Diagram Tool Bar; the Symbol Palette
is on the left. You can also draw your own symbols using the Draw Tool
Bar across the bottom of the window; and you can re-size your diagram
on the screen with the Zoom buttons in the left corner of the bottom scroll
bar.
2. Diagram View - Main Idea
Inspiration opens a new document with one symbol in the middle of the
screen with the words "Main Idea" highlighted, ready for you
to enter your topic or idea and begin working with it.
Let's go ahead and use Inspiration to brainstorm a simple autobiography, an "All about me" diagram.
With Main Idea highlighted, type in "All About Me." Click away from the symbol.
3. Adding Symbols
Benefit: Inspiration has several ways for you to add symbols in your diagram,
that way you can decide what works best for you. Let's look first at using
the Create tools.
3(a) Create Tool (Order is very
important!)
There are two Create tools on the Diagram Tool Bar that add symbols in
the direction of the arrows. There is a Create tool to add symbols horizontally
and vertically and there is a Create tool to add symbols at diagonals.
The Create tools create a linked symbol in the direction of the arrow.
Add a linked symbol from All About Me by selecting “All About Me” by clicking on it and then move the mouse up over the Create tool on the right. The arrows highlight in blue as you position the mouse over them. That tells you which direction the symbol will be created. Click on the arrow to the lower left and a new symbol to the lower left of your main idea will be created. With the symbol selected, type in "Family".
Practice creating a new symbol in a different direction. Call it “Hobbies”.
3(b)
RapidFire™ (Order is very important!)
Another way to add symbols to your diagram is by using Inspiration's RapidFire
tool. Benefit: RapidFire allows you to get your ideas down quickly. Since
your ideas don't wait patiently or come to you in any order, this feature
is great for brainstorming.
Brainstorm some of the things you like to do under Hobbies. With Hobbies selected, click on RapidFire on the Tool Bar to get started. The red lightening bolt after “Hobbies” tells you that RapidFire is turned on. Type in some hobbies. Enter each new word or idea and then press Enter after each one. The enter key tells Inspiration that you want to add your next idea. As you type and press Enter after each idea, Inspiration automatically puts each idea into a symbol and draws a link for you.
When you’re finished your last idea, just click away and your last thought becomes a symbol. Click away
4.
Point and Type
When you have a random thought, the easiest way to add it to your diagram
is as an unconnected idea with Point and Type. Just click in an open area
of your diagram and start typing.
5.
Drag and Drop
We've been adding symbols that are basic shapes. We can also use Drag
and Drop to use symbols from our symbol (picture) libraries. Find a symbol
in the libraries which relates to one of your hobbies and drag and drop
it next to one of the ideas in your diagram.
There are two ways to find just the right symbol you want to use from
the symbol libraries. First you can click through each library using the
right and left arrows. Or you can jump right to the library you want to
use. If we click on the down arrow and then click on it we see a whole
list of libraries.
6.
Working with Links
Let's look now at Links, the lines and arrows that connect our ideas and
tell us more about the relationships between them.
6(a) Add Link with Link Tool
The Link tool makes linking ideas really easy. Just click on the Link
tool on the tool bar. Click on the symbol you want the link to come from
and then click on the symbol you want the link to end on.
6(b)
Add text to link
Notice that when a link is selected, it has a dotted rectangle on it.
This box is where you can add link text, like you saw earlier in the Sound
concept map example. Text on the link tells more about the relationship
between the two symbols.
7.
Working with Symbols
7(a) Change Symbol Shapes
We used Drag and Drop to bring a couple of symbols into our diagram. We
can also replace an existing symbol with an image from our symbol palette.
Open
list of symbol libraries and select an image which matches one of your
categories. With the category selected, click on the image you wish to
replace it with.
8. Importing graphics
We can also bring other images into Inspiration and save them as symbols
by simply copying and pasting them or dragging them and dropping them.
9.
Move idea symbols around
It's easy to move your symbols around. Click on one of your ideas and
move it a bit. Inspiration keeps the link connected as you move the symbol.
10. Grow Symbol
You can also change the size and shape of each symbol. With a symbol selected,
click and drag from any of the corners to resize it.
11.
Zoom Mountains
Using the Zoom mountains, down here in the lower left corner, we can zoom
in or out to re-size our diagram. Let's make it a little bit bigger Zoom
larger and then take it back to the original size Zoom back.
12.
Hyperlinking
Inspiration also allows you to tie the resources of the Internet into
your diagrams and outlines through hyperlinking. We can create a hyperlink
to either an email address or an Internet address. Type in the address
of a site below the text of a word so that both are in the symbol. Then
click away. Inspiration automatically detects the link.
13.
Hyperlinking selected text
We can also select specific text to make a link. Select some text. Go
to the Utility menu, move to Internet and click on URL Hyperlink. The
top window shows the text you’ve selected. The bottom window is
where you enter the link, either a URL or an email address will work.
14. Arrange
We have been working with a freeform diagram. Inspiration also gives us
options for automatically arranging our diagram with the Arrange tool.
Select Main Idea and Point out Arrange. Arrange lets you organize your
diagram into different styles, including different types of trees and
webs. Change your web using a number of the different arrangements to
see how it would look.
15. Position Tool
We can use the Position Tool to place our diagram exactly where we want
it on the screen. Click on the Position tool Click on Position and note
that your pointer becomes a hand - a grabber hand. Click on your diagram
and move it to the middle of the screen. Click on the diagram and move
it to the centre of the screen.
16.
Fit to Window
We can also click on the Zoom window down by the Zoom Mountains and tell
Inspiration to automatically fit our diagram to the maximum window size.
17.
Change Colors
We can use colors to show relationships and groupings in our Inspiration
diagrams. Select all of a branch of your map and change them the colour.
By changing the colors of the entire group, you can tell they're related
when you look at the diagram. Colour changing is via Effects on the toolbar.
18.
Multi-color Symbols
You have the ability to change each color of a symbol. Select a symbol
and then click on the Multi-Color Symbol tool (Click on the paintbrush).
Change the color of a picture to match the rest of the group.
Adapted
from "One-hour Workshop Inspiration® 6" for use by the "Learning
Quest" students
