Word Cloud Valentine Cards

Word clouds have become a popular advertising trend, and are great for making personalized valentine cards. Simply visit one of the many websites and decide on the text you would like to use, select various options like font and colour, submit your choices, and your words will show up beautifully arranged. It’s a great way to make unique looking cards that stand out from the unimaginative options available for kids.

Materials

access to a computer and printer
scissors
glue stick
coloured card stock
white glue
foamies or 3D dots
marker for writing names
small, individually wrapped chocolates eg. Hershey’s Kisses

Instructions

1. Explore word cloud websites. Here are two great ones:

http://www.wordle.net/ (Your text comes out in a random shape)

http://www.tagxedo.com/ (This one allows you to select a shape eg.heart, and is the one I would recommend for this project).

These websites are easy to navigate, with clear instructions. All the children have to do is decide on the text they want to include, as well as other preferences such as font, colour, size etc. before they submit their choices. Remember, you can repeat words, and the more often you use the same word, the bigger it will show up. You can even include the recipient’s name as part of the text.

2. Once the final design has been selected, you’ll need to save it in order to print it. I’m sure there are numerous ways of doing this, but here’s what I did:

Use a program called Grab, go under ‘capture’ and chose ‘selection’. Position the cursor at the upper left corner of the image, click on your mouse and hold while moving your cursor to the bottom right corner. Once the entire image has been selected, release mouse. Save this image and if necessary, adjust size and quality before printing.

2. Print as many copies of the image as you need. Cut out heart shape and glue onto coloured card stock with glue stick. If you want the heart to be raised from the surface, add some 3D Dots or a couple of foamies underneath using either white glue or double-sided tape. Finally, write the recipient and sender names on the card, and attach a small chocolate with a drop of white glue. Allow to dry.