Comic Life is featured in a wonderful print article in the current April/May Canadian Teacher Magazine by Renée Jordan, titled “Beyond Paper and Pencil”.

Renée Jordan, is a certified teacher from The Greater Victoria School District No. 61 in Victoria and currently works as a Learning Specialist in New York City. Reneé can also be found on Twitter. 

Excerpts from the article:

As a Learning Specialist I often work with students who struggle with the writing process. Sometimes my students need in-depth instruction on written conventions, whereas other times they merely need an alternative medium for demonstrating their writing skills. The best way to build students’ writing competencies, regardless of their current ability, is to offer them multiple opportunities to practise. Therefore, it is vital that as educators we find tools, beyond paper and pencil tasks, that our students will find engaging and motivating. The following resources are tools I routinely use and recommend for struggling learners…

Comic Life can feel like it requires a few more tech skills than the aforementioned tools, however, it is actually incredibly intuitive and easy to use. Visual storytelling is a great medium for students to use to share their ideas. Comics are an alternative way for students to express their creativity, while building their writing skills in a way that isn’t over- whelming. In particular, Comic Life is a fun, play-based program that helps students engage in this process.

Students are able to select from templates to get them started, as well as upload and edit their own images to help tell their stories. Students are then able to craft, insert and edit text, which can be viewed in the comic book form or a text only format. At times, a blank page can feel intimating to struggling writers, but it is amazing to see what students can accomplish when they are allowed to use images to story board their ideas. Often when my students change their comics to the word-only, Script Editor format they are shocked at how much they have written.

Beyond writing, Comic Life also allows your students to bolster their 21st century learning skills of graphic design, simple photo editing and digital photography.

You can read the complete “Beyond Paper and Pencil” article or you might like to check out the entire issue of the April/May edition of Canadian Teacher Magazine.