In my past days as a social studies teacher, I love filling my room full of maps, charts, posters and flags to help support my goal of making my classroom an inviting space. There was one time, however, that I created an amazing image using a little-known strategy called “tile printing” or rasterbation (sorry… that’s just the name 🙂 ). The technique has actually been around for decades and many veteran teachers may remember tile printing strategies from 80s and 90s printing software like the Print Shop.
Tile printing is still very much around and you can use a number of web-based tools to create great, bold images for your classroom walls.
It is a simple process, even with low quality images.
There is an excellent how to video on this top the excellent DIY Tryin’ podcast from Revision3:
They recommend two tools, the Rasterbator or PosterRazor. Both are excellent, free tools.
WARNING: This is a SWEET classroom decoration project, but, it will consume both paper and ink/toner. Use with caution.
Have fun!
P.S. My last use of this involved taking a picture of European philosopher Frederick Nietzsche, blowing it up to 10 feet tall and covering a whole wall next to my classroom during a unit on European philosophers in my AP European History class. While it was a bit scary, my students LOVED it.