Visuaulizing Lessons

Visuaulizing Lessons

Lesson: Adding a piece to Harry's Brain

==> This lesson is helped by having a classroom across the hall pop popcorn (or pop it yourself).

==> Bring out the poster of Harry. Explain that today we will be adding another piece to the puzzle in Harry's brain. Remind the kids that Harry's brain reminds us of all the strategies that great readers use when they read. Review the pieces that have been added previously.

==> Today we are going to add a piece called visualizing. Visual means that you can see something. When you visualize you see pictures in your head. We call those pictures mental images. Great reader's visualize when they read.

==> When we visualize it's like taking the words and putting them in a microwave like popcorn and the words pop up and puff up in our minds. We can smell them, see them, feel them. Just like that feeling you get when you come in and the smell of fresh popped popped corn fills your mind... visualizing brings a book to life inside our heads.

==> Today I'm going to read you a story. I'm not going to show you the pictures. I want you to let the words fill your brain and see what happens inside your head. When you have a powerful mental image put your thumb up for just a moment and then put it back down again and get ready for the next mental image.

==> Read The Salamander Room or another story that illicits powerful mental images. You might want to stop every so often to share your own mental image or let a child share theirs.

Lesson: Awaken your senses

==> Soak cotton balls in familiar liquids such as orange juice, vanilla, peppermint, dressing, sun lotion, soap, pickle juice, etc. Place each cotton ball in a small ziplock baggie.

==> Bring out the first baggie and pass it around so that children can smell it. Have them close their eyes as they smell it and get a picture in their head.

==> What do you see in your head when you smell that cotton ball? The picture that is painted in your head by that smell is called a visualization.

==> Smells can paint pictures and so can words.

==> One of the things that readers do when they read is to create pictures or mental images in their heads as they read. They imagine what the character looks like and sounds like, etc. They imagine what the setting looks like.

==> Today as I read you part of a story I am going to talk about my mental images. I am even going to sketch a few of them for you.

==> Read Night Sounds, Morning Colors by Rosemary Wells, talk about and sketch your mental images. (You might want to take several days sharing this book in small snippets.)

==> Invite the children to close their eyes and let their minds fill with mental images.

Night Sounds, Morning Colors

Lesson: Imagination is the True Magic Carpet- N.V. Peale

==> Read Roxaboxen. What are the children in this story doing? Using their imaginations...

==> When we visualize sometimes we use our imagination to imagine what something might be like. I've never been to the moon, but when I read about the moon my mind makes images of what it thinks the moon must be like.

==> Norman Vincent Peale once said that the imagination is the true magic carpet. What do you think he meant by this?

==> How do you think that using our imagination helps us as readers?

Part 2 As you read Harold and the Purple Crayon have kids visualize what Harold is drawing and sketch it on their paper. Encourage the kids to spread out so that they aren't copying someone else's image but rather practicing creating their own mental image.

Wild, Wild Sunflower Child Anna

Lesson: Let's practice

Lesson: Eyes of the heart

==> When we think about seeing and visualizing we usually think about our eyes.

==> But sometimes the most powerful visualizing that I do is done with my heart and not with my eyes. It's as if our brain creates a mental image that we can't sketch. I call those mental images of the heart.

==> I'm going to read a book today that creates powerful images on my heart everytime I read it. I can see the softness, feel the tenderness and the love. My brain can't find an image so my heart paints it instead.

==> As I read this story I want you to soak it in. See if it paints pictures in your head or in your heart.

Add your content here

Lesson: Mental Images Can Have a Powerful Affect on us as Readers

==> Sometimes books don't just create mental images of what's happening inside the story, but they stir up mental images from our own lives. We make connections and those connections come to life inside our heads and we relive moments from our lives.

==> Sometimes we even see ourselves in the characters. Or people we know find their way into our mental images.

Lesson: Not all books create the same mental images

==> The way an author uses words helps to create and even shape our mental images.

==> Read Octopus Under the Sea- what types of images does it illicit?

==> Read Hello Ocean- what types of images does it illicit?

==> How do your visual images and feelings interact?

Lesson: Uniquely Yours

==> Our mental images are uniquely our own. What I see in my head is not exactly what you see in your head. Our mental images are shaped by our schema and by the text together.

==> Select 4 poems that children will have schema for. Read each one several times instructing the children to listen carefully to each one. (Have 8-10 copies of each poem.)

==> Think about which poem created the most vivid mental images for you.

==> Take a copy of the poem which you selected adn a piece of drawing paper. Find a quiet place where you can work alone. Read the poem to yourself and then make a sketch of the mental images that you saw in your head.

==> Allow for about 10 minutes of work time and then gather children together again for a time of sharing. Have children sit in groups with the other children who selected the same poem and talk about their images.

==> Have groups share what they noticed.

==> Why do you suppose the pictures are all so distinctively different when you heard the same poem?

==> We all have different schema and our schema shapes our mental images.