So to quote Kelly Clarkson, "here I am once again" talking to you about Canva. And one of my absolute favorite things to make on Canva is collages. I don't know why, but they just soothe my brain. I have made collages for each month of the year so I can change out the wallpaper on my desktop at work. I've also created a collage of just pictures of Glen Powell because I'm also crazy.
But most importantly, I've made so many collages for books. I've linked a slideshow of examples; the titles of the books are in the speaker notes section. But I've done this either as a way to get kids interested in a title. Like one of those "convincing you to read a book based on the aesthetic" or, most recently, for our Summer Reading activity that involves matching the books to their collage and summary.
So I thought this would be a really fun assignment for an English class. The ultimate goal of the lesson would be to have students effectively identify themes in a book by representing them through pictures. But the secondary goal is to ensure that the students have a little more expertise when it comes to using canva.
Click here to view lesson plan
As you can see above, I decided that this type of assignment/project is a little more on the advanced side, and I believe an example of something that an Honors-level student should be perfectly capable of doing. You could tweak this assignment by just having students create a collage based on their favorite things or just a collage that represents them in general. That could be a great start of the year activity. But I think tying it to an I-SAIL standard of being able to determine central ideas of a text and track how they're represented by specific details is what makes this a great activity for an ELA class. That standard would then be assuredly accomplished by having students present their collages briefly and explain how at least 4 of their images directly reflect their book.
For example, if I made a collage for The Great Gatsby, I would have pictures of flapper fashion and a big mansion on a lake. I would say that this picture of the flappers reflects the time period of this novel, and the big mansion is Gatsby's house, representing the theme of old money versus new money.
Let me know what you think? Is there a book that you would love to do a collage for?
Oh Marissa I am soooo glad I clicked on yours to comment on! First of all, I love the title. Second of all, I loooooove Canva. Third of all, I LOVE COLLAGES. There is so much awesomeness here. I actually have never created a digital collage. I have only ever made them with physical paper scraps of words and images. I will be creating some cool Canva collages of my own thanks to your tutorial! Love this nexus of academic and personal joy!
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