The Movie in Your Mind: Visualization Activities

I know I know I know, I have probably posted about this book 4 times, but seriously, SO GOOD. Every lesson in here is so valuable, and I'm working through all of them...



So, in this book she discusses the importance of teaching kids about visualization. I feel like many of my kids struggle to form good mental pictures as they read which hinders their comprehension. It is great to discuss this and make them aware of their own mental pictures. I took several ideas from her book and made them my own.

One idea I love is having students write or draw their mental images as they hear various pieces of music. I used music from The Nutcracker, The Jurassic Park theme, and a few other pieces that had different tones. I LOVED hearing what kids were picturing when they heard the music. I think it is so cool to make them aware of what they are seeing in their mind.

Then, we used this book to help us continue our practice...



This book is perfect for visualization because it is hilarious, the chapters are short, and the descriptions of the students and teachers definitely paint a good picture in your head!



Here is what a few of my kids drew to represent their thoughts! Fun!

Reflection Art

Oh blog friends, life has been CRAZY! I have neglected this little blog due to me putting together my Master's Portfolio/Presentation. I am almost finished, and will present in three weeks. I have so have many posts to catch up on! We have been doing many fun things lately; similes and metaphors, visualizing lessons, history, etc. But for today, I will show you a little art lesson that my kids did recently. I thought it was neat, because it really made them think outside the box as they put together a design. My E.A. taught this lesson, so I'm not sure where exactly it came from, but here is how we did it!

First, fold a piece of paper in half and write your name on the fold. It works best if your name is in cursive. It also works best to use a pastel or go over it multiple times to help with the next step...



Fold the paper in half and rub on it, so that the crayon/pastel transfers to the other side, making the reflection! Then, you can go over it to make it bold.



Then, encourage the kids to create a design, creature, monster with their name reflection. If you want the lesson to really really focus on reflection you could have them incorporate that into their coloring. Or, you could simply let them have at it. However, we tried really hard to have them color it reflectively. Super cute!



I thought they turned out super cute!!



I think they all look like cute little monsters!



Happy Friday!!

Anchors Away

I'm linking up with Tales of Frogs and Cupcakes Reading/Language Arts anchor chart link party. Here are a few that I have posted before and some new ones!

Read to Self anchor chart...kinda a reading and management anchor chart...



I know I have posted on this before, but seriously y'all, Tanny McGregor's book is amazing!! No matter what elementary grade you are in, it has the most amazing lessons on how to teach skills such as questioning, inferring, determining importance, metacognition, etc etc etc. Like, run, don't walk and buy this book. She includes pictures of anchor charts to go with the lessons, so the next few pictures shows my anchor charts inspired from her book:

Comprehension Connections



Metacognition



Connecting to Text



Thinking Stems for Inferring...(Her inferring lessons are some of my absolute favorites!)



We worked on "Determining Importance" from Comprehension Connections as well!



Then we applied our "determining importance" skills to portions of non-fiction text that went with our social studies unit, events leading up to the Revolutionary War..



This one is not from Comprehension Connections, just one I made to help us as we discuss author's point of view. I typed the words before we put it together because it is just SO much writing. This can be a tough concept so having the chart up reminds me to talk about it through most of our stories.



We are still adding to this anchor chart as we learn more about figurative language...



(Not really an anchor chart, but here is where we have been collecting examples of figurative language from our own reading.)



Nothing fancy here, but my kids and I are remembering to discuss so many concepts thanks to these little charts! Thanks to Tales of Frogs and Cupcakes for the great linky party idea!