Wordle, www.wordle.net, is a website for creating word clouds.  Simply type in a series of words using commas.  The more often the word is included, the larger it will appear in the final word cloud.  Then customize the themes, fonts, and colors.  Use the SMART camera tool to take a picture and add it to your SMART file.  There are a variety of classroom applications.  Ask your students to write down five words to describe a character from a story, a scientific concept following the unit of story, or an upcoming holiday.  This can be an individual or small group task.  Or create a Wordle on a topic of study and use it to preview the chapter.  Students can view it and make connections to prior knowledge.  Or type each of your student’s names to create a class word cloud that can be an image on your classroom website or your classroom computer’s desktop background.  TIP:  Type your words in a Word document and paste them into the field on the site.  Because if you decide to “go back” and add, delete, or change words, you will be sent back to the home page.  Your work is not saved on the site.  Also, for two words that you’d like to stay together such as United States, put a ~ between the words (United~States).