Inspired by Inspiration

Last week we learned about Inspiration. Inspiration is a tool that enables you to design your own diagrams to supplement classroom topics. You can create a diagram of any topic and customize it to your needs with organization, colors, fonts, etc. I created a diagram of the Life Cycle of a Butterfly, which meets the curriculum standard of GLE 0207.4.1 for second grade. I found Inspiration fun and interesting to use because I was able to make what I wanted from scratch and really customize it. I could make it look like I wanted it to and focus on material I wanted to focus on at the same time. One thing I found difficult was making the arrows for my life cycle. My instructor, Don, and I were unable to find a way to rotate images and/or arrows. Therefore I did not have arrows that fit into my cycle correctly. I had to use arrows from Word Documents and work on them in Photoshop before they were usable. I think it would be a great idea to make diagrams with empty "symbols" attached to the main ideas, so that I can print them and let the children fill them out. Diagrams and flow charts really help children to organize concepts and comprehend the content. I would definitely use Inspiration for this use in my classroom. Next time I would like to try making a web diagram instead of a cycle.


This is the diagram I made using Inspiration: