15 great uses for a digital camera
Digital cameras are indispensable these days, especially for homeschoolers. There are so many things you can do with one, like:
- Use it to document things you can’t put in a book. Plays, 3D projects, songs, events of all kinds. These are life and these are the stuff homeschooling is made of. Get it all!
- When doing a project, take pictures of options. Then you can see all options at once and make better decisions. For example, a collage or a layout can be difficult to work out because you can’t remember what you liked best. Capture it and you can choose your favorite with ease.
- Don’t have a scanner? Take photos of notebook work. You can keep a digital copy of their best work in case something should happen.
- Take pictures of things that don’t keep, like clouds or leaves. None of the mess, and you have exactly the photo you need.
- Journal your life for relatives.
- Use it as an opportunity for the kids to learn photography. Maybe they can turn it into a business.
- Use it to take custom pictures for activities like bingo and flashcards.
- Take pictures of the family for a one-of-a-kind picture book for baby.
- Use pictures as story starters to strengthen writing skills.
- Have a digital scavenger hunt. List things they must find and capture with the camera. First to get back with all of them wins.
- Let siblings take pictures of one another to practice being the director and taking direction.
- Use it to snap pictures of your homeschool inventory for insurance.
- With iron-on transfer paper available at your local discount store you can make cool tees for your homeschool outings. These make great gifts too.
- Make a video or take pictures of how to get to your house for visiting friends.
- Use the photos to make gifts for birthdays and Christmas. Calendars and such are always big hits.
Have another idea? Leave a comment!
12 Comments
Trackbacks
- Life’s A Weekend! » I like this!
- Principled Discovery » The Carnival of Homeschooling’s Field Guide to Homeschoolers
- Principled Discovery » The Carnival of Homeschooling’s Field Guide to Homeschoolers
- Lesson Pathways Blog » The Latest Edition: Blog Carnival of Homeschooling
Love your ideas… ~ Keep the memories but clear (compact) the clutter. Take photos of those space fillers and dust collectors on the mantel piece that Aunty Alice gave you years ago.
You are so right. It is easy to find yourself awash is clutter. Sometimes that little figurine Aunt Alice gave you can be immortalized in a photo and then passed on to someone who will cherish it.
Also a dig camera will prevent tons of pad pics you feel guilty about tossing. You only keep the ones you really want, and only print the ones you need to. No more shoeboxes full of photos.
Love this blog Anna!
Fantastic ideas for your digital camera. ( :
Wouldn’t a homemade cookbook be fun to do for a one of a kind Christmas gift as well – with photos of you and your kids making the recipe and pics of the finished product.
Thanks Mandi! I’m trying to post more often. Sigh…
The cookbook is a GREAT idea! What gramma wouldn’t love a book like that?
Oh! #14 is a great one I never would’ve thought of, but that someone like me could really use! ^_^
Let them compare the Before & After version of the room to feel proud of their work, and let them enjoy watching themselves working really fast (fast forward) or backward (reverse). They just might beg you to LET them clean from now on. LOL!
When my kids were little, I would set the camera up so they could see themselves and let them do “news stories” about what they were learning, what they were building, show & tell, whatever they wanted to say. Talk about keeping them busy! They love looking at themselves, you know.
And filming was a great motivator for cleaning. Remind them time is limited.
I think that this post can be intertwined with the “what to do when Mom is sick” post. I have used my digital camera many times when my 5 year old comes in and says, “Mom…I can’t find it…I looked all over the counter and it isn’t there” I send her back with the camera to take a picture and then point it out to her. Or when she swears and declares that the playroom is all cleaned up after spending all of 30 seconds in there I can send her back with the camera to “prove her case”. The best is when she comes running to tell me that her little sister just made a HUGE mess in the bathroom…send her with the camera to asses the damages!!
When I am sick the LAST thing I want to do is run all over the house!
LOL!!!
Blessings~
Shelley
Hope I’m not repeating anyone since I’m reading while distracted, but two more:
1) Great for preschoolers. Go on a shape walk, take pictures and then put in plastic page protector for children to trace the shapes they can find. Actually, you can imitate all of Tana Hobart’s books for these kinds of things. Letters, numbers, shapes…
2) When I taught in a classroom, I made a scrapbook of our activities. The kids could look at them, and write captions which really encouraged some of the more reluctant writers. And readers as they looked at the pictures over and over.
I loved the scavenger hunt idea. We did a similar thing where I took pictures of things around our town and the children had to hunt them down, but I like the idea of THEM taking the pictures too.