Easy – and free – ways to add interactivity

Jill Cavotta's caffeine-fueled interest in my Google Map inspired my third required pre-institute blog post. Thank you, Jill.

Maps with pictures and callouts are just one free and very, very easy way to add interactivity to storytelling. Here are some others, along with examples:

Google Fusion: It allows you to marry delimited data with a map. All you need is a spreadsheet, and you can let Google look up addresses for you. Look in the right rail of this Cronkite News post to see how Imelda Mejia married newborn screening rates at hospitals with a map of Arizona. Could you marry state data on meningitis vaccination opt-out rates at schools in your district?

StoryMap JS: Knight Labs out of Northwestern University is dying for people to use its neat and free interactive tools. Cronkite News has joined in, and the results have been great. See how Agnel Philip and Emily Mahoney married photos, documents and video to complement an in-depth look at how Arizona law enforcement agencies use proceeds from forfeited assets. This one is incredibly easy. Could you do a map-based story on how old buildings at your school are? How far smoke shops are from campus?

SoundCite JS: Another free Knight Labs tool, SoundCite JS allows you to marry audio with text. See how Rachel Lund used it to add the sound of a recorded call residents of a rural Arizona county can sign up to receive each day to make sure they are OK. The link is in the third graph. Could you link to audio of a song in a story about marching band rehearsal?

DocumentCloud: Rather than linking to PDFs of documents, which is a fine way to add interactivity, DocumentCloud allows you to link to points within a document. See how Jessica Testa used it to link to relevant sections of an environmental impact statement she was explaining. Could you link to sections of district budget documents that involve your school?

Qzzr: My favorite new, free toy, it allows you to create and embed quizzes. See below for a relevant one I created for practice.

The best part about using these is you can show your students they exist and they'll show you  how they work and help you learn their potential. That's what I did.

Steve Elliott
Arizona State University
Phoenix