Images allow students to see the real thing, it can illustrate concepts and show examples of what you are discussing, images inspire discussions on the topic developing language, and can encourage students to work as a team.
The following website suggests practical ways to use digital images in teaching and learning , it gets you thinking!
Photographs, graphics and images come in many different shapes and sizes. Generally photograph files such as GIF files or JPG files are usually quite large and cannot be easily uploaded online. To upload pictures online it is important to reduce the size of the file, this will reduce the quality but it will still be useful for web use. To do this you can download a free program called Mobaphoto.
Mobaphoto is a portable tool box for digital photography, once downloaded and you have installed the program it is very easy to use. It gives the user four main tool options: Batch photo resizer, Digital gallery creator, Batch photo editor and Batch picture renamer. The program also allows you to crop your images and correct red eye.
To resize your image select, Batch photo resizer, a display window will then appear allowing you to browse and select as many images as you select to resize, there is also a small viewing photo window, now click resize. You will be prompted to save the resized pictures and now they are ready to use and upload online. The upload time to load your pictures online will also be much shorter as the file is much smaller therefore saving time.
I have resized and included a few images below from a trip to Australia Zoo on the Sunshine Coast Queensland. In the classroom context these photographs could be used to: begin discussions about the animals in the pictures and asses students current knowledge, the educator can provide students with an extension task or project to select an animal in a photograph and submit a research project, begin a theme in the classroom, create further lesson plans on the selected animals, discuss where they come from, where they are found, extend on geography, extend to other animals e.g. African animals and begin another unit of work.
Images taken from Australia Zoo Queensland
Reference
JISC Digital Media. (2010). Practical ways to use digital images in teaching and learning. Retrieved November 28, 2010, from
Mobaphoto, (2008). The portable toolbox for digital photography. Retrieved November 28, 2010, from
Central Queensland University (CQU). (2010). FAHE11001 – Images/Mobaphoto: Study Guide. Rockhampton. QLD, Australia: Author.