Cartooning Helps Understanding

Using nonlinguistic representations, like cartooning, helps students reinforce the concepts that they are learning. I like the guided nature of this activity. The teacher provides students w... See More

Using nonlinguistic representations, like cartooning, helps students reinforce the concepts that they are learning. I like the guided nature of this activity. The teacher provides students with possible clip art and content vocabulary. Students create short cartoons that represent geologic concepts. Although this activity is designed for a middle school class, I could use it with my high school earth science class.

Great!!!

I marveled at the idea of cartooning in class. I knew it would be a great idea for motivating students. Authentic activities are excellent motivators for most low achievers. I have tried car... See More

I marveled at the idea of cartooning in class. I knew it would be a great idea for motivating students. Authentic activities are excellent motivators for most low achievers. I have tried cartooning in my class as a choice of product but it is rare that someone will select it. I have used comics to engage my students in concepts. The boys really enjoyed my attempts but I had to have other activities for the rest of the students to select.

Here is an Excellent Activity

I plan on using this in my classroom as a station activity. This is an excellent activity for students at all learning levels

Humor and Cartoons

“Humor can help students make new connections in learning and improves retention of information (Garner 2006).” This article is an example of how art-reading and science can come together t... See More

“Humor can help students make new connections in learning and improves retention of information (Garner 2006).” This article is an example of how art-reading and science can come together to produce an activity that engages students and fosters retention of information. An activity information sheet for the teacher is provided which explains the four components of this process and addresses the approach of this technique. The culminating activity is an original cartoon about science issues. This is a great way to engage the underachieving learner as well as create a successful formative assessment for the student.

Cartooning in Science

This resource provides strategies for you to set-up and support your students in science cartooning. My MS students immediately connected with this activity and I utilized cartooning in an ... See More

This resource provides strategies for you to set-up and support your students in science cartooning. My MS students immediately connected with this activity and I utilized cartooning in an earth science assessment along with an assigned set of vocab words on the rock cycle.

Engaging Students using Cartoons

In this article, the authors outline a detailed lesson that integrates literature, science, and art for the purpose of communicating science literacy. Citing research regarding analyzing, i... See More

In this article, the authors outline a detailed lesson that integrates literature, science, and art for the purpose of communicating science literacy. Citing research regarding analyzing, improving, and creating cartoons the authors demonstrate an increase in student achievement and student motivation. In this lesson, students begin with a hands-on investigation of interesting rock samples. After getting students excited about rocks, the teachers introduce books on various Earth science topics. Teachers then introduced the idea of making humorous cartoons by showing colorful and humorous examples of Earth science cartoons. Finally, students are encouraged to create their own humorous cartoons. As part of the article, the authors include a detailed activity sheet and they include information about the lessons correlation to the National Science Standards. This is an excellent article for increasing student motivation and a great idea for engaging students. I look forward to try

Cartooning in Science

This resource provides strategies for you to support your students in an easy and organized manner. My MS students immediately connected with this activity and I utilized cartooning in an e... See More

This resource provides strategies for you to support your students in an easy and organized manner. My MS students immediately connected with this activity and I utilized cartooning in an earth science assessment along with an assigned set of vocab words on the rock cycle.

Use Cartooning to Enhance Rocks and Minerals Unit

This is an easy-to-read article which describes how a sixth grade science class, studying rocks and minerals, used humor and cartooning to enhance the student's learning and subsequent acade... See More

This is an easy-to-read article which describes how a sixth grade science class, studying rocks and minerals, used humor and cartooning to enhance the student's learning and subsequent academic achievement. They decided to use this approach to aid some of their reluctant learners to be more engaged in the learning process. By developing a lesson that begins with hands-on exploration of rocks and minerals, then giving the students access to a variety of print resources related to the topic, and finally giving them clip art backgrounds to develop cartoons to demonstrate their understanding of rocks and minerals. While I feel this is a nice approach to use with students and does capitalize on those who would enjoy this type of activity, I didn't feel the authors built the lesson as effectively as they might have to ensure the students mastered the science content indicators.