How to create a comic with basic tools

The next comic has been done with basic tools:

- Camera to take pictures.

- Paint to modify the pictures.

- Word processor to add titles, bubbles and other comic characteristics.

First of all, a design of the story is strongly recommended, I mean, what story your students want to tell. You, as teacher/parent/educator, can help them with the topic of the story.
One idea is to ask for some topics they are interested in and the do a survey with all your students. In this way you encourage them to participate as well as they feel motivated. Once your students have decided what to tell, it is time to organize the story. In my case, I teach them that every story has three mainly parts, remember that it is focused on PreK students: beginning, middle and the end. And please, try to help them with examples of stories they already know (and even better, the most recent stories told in classroom) and let them identify each part.
The story decided to tell is about the recess time, since today it had rained early in the morning and some parts of  the garden were wet. I tried to help them by asking them how we usually prepare to go to the outdoor learning area. Then, one by one started to tell me how: they are in a line, the students in charge of the doors go to their positions,... other students wanted to share other ideas to use in the story. After that, I looked through the window and everything was wet, my next question was what would happen if you were in the garden. Again, help them, please, with connections to their experiences... until some of them can say something to add to the story; indeed, they gave us some ideas for the story. And eventually we got this amazing story with my "champions".

Recreo o no recreo by Paco Usero on Scribd

If you have a tablet with an ebook reader app you can download this file https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4elwj35ibmYNm9mLVFmX0hkMzQ/view?usp=sharing and they can read it.

Comic Patio Mojado

Publish at Calameo

Calameo is a free web that sets your documents as a traditional book. When you and your children finish your comic, you can save it as a .pdf file, then upload it on this web. There, you can have more options to choose and share it with your friends.

If you prefer to do it by using an app with music, you can use Adobe Spark Video. Open this app and add the pictures that you and your children have selected to create a comic. Besides, you can add some music.
Have you seen how easy it is? Do you think you can do one comic with your children? If so, it is going to be a good time to enjoy creating a story together.

If you want to share your beautiful and awesome story, please, leave a comment with your file.

By Mr Usero.
Comic-Creator Project.

Why gamification and digital learning in education?

Gamification of Learning

There are many reasons to use games and digital learning in schools. Our students are living in the Society of Information and Knowledge and they are ready to interact with them. They are already born with digital skills since we can see one-or-two-year-old children using smartphones and tablets, they can use their fingers to zoom images and slide pictures,...

In the following presentation Digital Gamification Benefits Presentation (Spanish) you can see all the benefits of Gamification and Digital Learning in Education.

“You create these communities around the game that do an incredible amount of intellectual work, and when they’re done with the work, they will leave the game and go to another game that’s more challenging. Can you imagine if we had that kind of environment in classrooms?” 

Constance Steinkuehler Squire Associate Professor in digital media at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

Webminar about Gamification and Education

(free translation)

In this webinar Gamification in education: from technique to methodology, Imma Marín Santiago, tells us how to apply gamification to the education and learning sector. 

In the educational context, gamification can assume the design of tasks and activities using the principles of gameplay. It is about taking advantage of the natural predisposition towards the game to improve the motivation towards learning, the acquisition of knowledge, the transmission of values, the development of competences, etc. 

Games overtake the "chain of failure" by allowing, as part of their design, multiple opportunities to carry out a task to their domain. KARL M. KAPP (Kapp, 2012) 

The gamification approach of some work proposals has been done for a long time as a way of reinforcing concrete learning contents. However, gamification is a new perspective. And if it were feasible to lead all the potential of time and experience of the students in the game towards learning? What if, moreover, we transcend the design of tasks and activities (technique) to put the game at the center of the teaching-learning process (methodology / strategy)? 

In this webinar we will learn to learn the principles of gamification and playing techniques to the education sector, achieving a greater predisposition towards learning by the students.