The Educational Value of Word Clouds

Have you visited Wordle? Try it. It's fun! All you have to do is enter the site, click "Create," then enter the text of your choice. Wordle then creates a word cloud that displays all of the different words that you entered. The size of the words reflects the frequency with which the words were used. You can then rearrange the word cloud, edit the words, choose different colors/fonts, etc. to make the cloud more aesthetically pleasing. Your results can then be printed and copied to whereever you want them.

From an educational standpoint, however, word clouds are a quick and easy method for students to visualize their word choice. By pulling the words out of context, the students may be better able to analyze the frequency and variety of word use. Moreover, they can judge the specificity and appropriateness of the words as well. Take for example, the above word cloud. I entered a rough draft of a piece regarding a memory of my father. Instantly, I can see that I used the word "game" more than any other. Is that the message I was trying to communicate? If not, I might want to go back and make some revisions to my original text. Further analysis reveals that the word "games" is just slightly smaller than the first. Perhaps I need to mix up my word choice a little more! Oh, and look at that word, "made." It sounds so lame--I know I can fix that. And so on...

Try Wordle. Have some fun with it, but learn from it as well!

For more information on other educational uses of word clouds, you might also want to visit this ReadWriteWeb site that analyzes inaugural speeches of various presidents. It is fascinating!