Parents love to see images of their students from class. Teachers are always looking for an increasingly easy way to share those images. If you happen to be one of those teachers who has an iPad, iPhone, or a Mac computer, you can setup a free iCloud account, and setup a dead simple way to push images from your classroom to an online web gallery. Check out my “proof of concept” video below, or watch it on Youtube.
WARNING! Sharing a Photostream publicly on the web via iCloud will make the images viewable to anyone with the link, so it’s best not to be sharing images that might be sensitive, and talk with your student’s parents beforehand to make sure they’re all comfortable with it.
While I don’t think this is the best way for everyone to share classroom pictures with parents, thanks to the new shared Photostreams ability in iOS6 on Apple’s devices, it is just about the easiest way to do it. You don’t even need an iPad to do it either; iPhoto on a Mac, an iPhone, or an iPod touch will all work just as nicely. I’m actually using the shared Photostream albums to send pictures that I take of my kids directly to my mother’s iPhone, so she has new pictures of her grandkids to show off each week.
I really just wanted to make a “proof of concept” video to show off how it could be done, without having to use a commercial site to share images that might put ads up, or force all users to create another account. As I said in the video, this isn’t even a long term solution for all of your photo sharing needs between school and home, just a fun way to share “in the moment” learning pictures, or share some cool stuff that happens throughout the week in your classroom. Heck, you could even use it as a way for students to be photojournalists, and share images from their learning experiences throughout the week, creating a visual diary of the weeks lessons and growth.
If you end of trying this, feel free to share with others, and let us know how it goes!
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Hey there, just came across your site…! awesome stuff! thank you…! any helpful hints on how to leave a caption at the bottom of the pics in photostream? i was actually shopping for a car and came across this ad… what a great way to display a car… was curious how he added the pic captions and how he made some pics big and some small… any thoughts?
https://www.icloud.com/photostream/#A25yeZFhXbcGI
thanks again,
ben
Glad you enjoyed the quick video about Photostream, Ben. And heck of a great name too!
You can add comments/captions like you mentioned to any photo in a photostream quite easily. Just click on the appropriate photostream on your iOS device that has the photos you’d like to caption. When you click on an individual photo that’s been shared in the stream, one of the options is to leave a comment. My guess is that this is what happened for the person selling that Highlander (great looking car in immaculate condition!).
I tested this out on a photostream image to make sure, and leaving a comment produced that nice caption-like effect!