A few months ago I wrote about assessing our students learning styles. I'm now working on gathering and organizing teaching strategies for each learning style. Here are a few things I've found helpful for our visual learners. According to an article on "Brighthubeducation" the following formats will benefit our students who learn best visually.

• Look at words or images on a page
• Use visual recall as a learning strategy
• Imagining what things look like to remember them
• Follow visual cues and landmarks during a journey or a task
• Watch videos
• Watch someone else perform the task or activity

Let's take a look at these strategies individually.

It's easy to spot a visual learner when teaching reading. These students can dive into a book. They may thrive on text. But what if you aren't teaching a reading skill? What about math concepts? These students benefit from having charts and diagrams, relating similarities and differences. Flashcards can be a helpful tool keep on hand. You don't have to buy them, just keep a pack of index cards on hand, and whip out a small set of cards for the facts, rules, or properties your students needs to memorize or learn. It can also be very beneficial to have your student write out these cards themselves, and include an example or a scenario that applies to the concept, skill, or understanding of focus. I use this simple personal glossary for every subject I tutor. 

Image from designthinkingschools.com

What exactly is visual recall as a learning strategy? I"m glad you asked, because I had the same question when I read this article. Here's a helpful explanation, but in a nutshell, this simply refers to using some form of imagery to help remember things. You may have seen someone tie a ribbon around their finger to remind them to take medication, or hold up 3 fingers to remember the items they need to collect. These are forms of visual recall, and we can help our students learn to use this strategy by teaching them to take visual notes. Instead of just writing down a term and it meaning, draw a picture that helps the student remember the meaning and/or application. Use graphic organizers to categorize bits of information. Insert photos into presentations. Whatever it takes to help your student visualize the material.

One of my favorite activities to do with a few of my students, starts off with me saying, "close your eyes. Now, imagine..." It doesn't matter what we are studying, when the student begins the lesson with a quick imagination exercise, their minds are more engaged the entire session. Once the lesson is underway, the student might realize that the image they thought of was way off. In that case, it's important to take a moment to help the student "re-visualize" the idea or concept with the more accurate understanding. Later, when your student is testing or needs to retrieve the information for a project or assignment, that image will be there waiting for them!

The next strategy has more to do with materials we use with our students than the actual strategies we use with them. Lessons, apps, and programs we use with our visual learners should be easily navigated by visual cues. This is especially true for non-readers and early readers who might not be able to read and understand complex written instructions. Providing our visual learners with materials that have visual cues to guide them will help them navigate with ease.

Videos can be extremely helpful for our visual learners. I would suggest, however, to search for and select videos ahead of time rather than on the spot during a lesson. Because our visual learners will be using the imagery we provide them, we need to spend a little extra time and effort to make sure the imagery we use is accurate and applicable. With the influx of Common Core lessons, I have found LearnZillion to be extremely helpful with my math students.

As teacher and tutors, do we take the time to model the activity for our students? Our visual learners will benefit greatly from watching us work through a complicated equation or sorting elements into their groups and periods,

Dou you have a strategy or two that wasn't listed here? Share your tips in the comments!

Thanks for stopping by!

                              Stefany (Interactive Learning with Miss Stefany)

Revolutionary Thinking Maps: The Declaration of Independence

I'm super excited to start the first of a series of posts on how I use Thinking Maps (graphic organizers) in my classroom to teach about the American Revolution.  5 things you should know about Thinking Maps--


1.  They provide students with a way to visualize and make sense of new content.
2.  If you teach them early in the year, students begin to use them independently.
3.  They are great for interactive notebooks.  Seriously great.
4.  You don't have to make copies to use them.  Pencil, paper, done.
5.  You can use them with all content.  Check out my Thinking Maps board on Pinterest for some ideas.  

Let's start with the Brace Map.  Brace Maps show part to whole relationships.  When teaching the Declaration of Independence, I love to have my 5th graders start with the primary source.  The actual document.  It's quite overwhelming at first glance.  Fancy language and unfamiliar words abound!  So, I start by drawing the skeleton of the map, showing students that we can look at the Declaration of Independence in four parts.  Then, we are able to read through and stop, summarize, and connect to what we've learned about the events leading to the American Revolution.  Check it out, below! 

Come back soon for more on using Thinking Maps to teach about the American Revolution.

--The Pensive Sloth
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Cool Supplies at the Big Box Stores

I promised my teenager a trip to the store yesterday, and I entertained myself looking for school supplies while trying to ignore what she was picking out to try on.  I mean, why raise my blood pressure until I absolutely have to do so?

We hit Target, which honestly is about the only store we ever get to……and I think I spent 10-15 minutes at the Dollar Spot inside the door.  Then I moved on the toys and games for the 4^th grader, and managed to find a game for school, and then finally we hit the summer clearance.  I had half a cart for me!  But look at what I found:

To be fair, I found the small crates (and big ones) at WalMart. 

Let me tell you how I plan to use all of these items.

US Maps – $1 – Target Dollar Spot – If you are like me and have zero classroom maps, these are just fabulous – and cheap.  I bought 12 and plan to laminate them in order to make them “dry erase” maps.  The maps do have the state names and capitals on them, but in 5^th grade we do landforms, waterways, etc., so this will be a terrific hands on tool.

Megaphone - $1.40 on clearance in the summer aisle – Target – Well, some of us are not blessed with loud whistles, and honestly, it was just cool (and loud.)

Packs of Erasers - $1 – Target Dollar Spot – My kids told me to get the packs of ice cream and crayon erasers.  There were also apples.  I plan to use these as cheap rewards. 

Dictionaries - $1 Target Dollar Spot – Okay, I know you are thinking, dictionaries?  However, they also had thesaurus and rhyming dictionaries.  (For Spanish teachers, they have Spanish-English dictionaries.)  I bought a rhyming dictionary and thesaurus for each table group.

Campbell’s Soup Alphabet Game - $7 – Target Game Clearance – I totally do not intend to play this as the game.  It comes with 36 alphabet dice.  I am thinking of using this to play Boggle on the doc cam.

Picnic Utensil Holder - $8 – Target Summer Clearance – Depending on where you live, these may be hard to find.  My Target only had 2 left, but I bought some last summer – they have them every year in different colors.  These are metal, so they are a bit pricey – that is why I try to catch them on clearance.  These are just the best organizers in the world.  Seriously.  I reorganized my entire craft closet at home with them.  I have one on my desk at school.  This year I plan to try table groups, and I am going to put a number on each one and keep the table supplies in it: pencils, highlighters, scissors, glue, thesaurus, rhyming dictionary, etc. 

Crates – small $1, large $3.50 – WalMart – They had at least 5 colors of the mini-crates and many more of the large ones.  I used the small ones to organize my classroom library last year, and I actually ran out of space.  Apparently, this size is hard to find after the college supplies are gone.  For $1, grab as many as you think you will need, and then add a few more.  I use the large ones for everything.  I use one for a library book return, one for portfolios, one for “to be copied,” etc.

Have you found any great deals for back to school?  What is your best classroom organization tip?

Amy Mezni

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Teaching Students About Their Learning Styles

As teachers (and tutors) we've been trained to recognize and differentiate according to student needs, including their individual learning styles. But how important is it for our students to understand their learning styles? I'd love to hear your thoughts on this one, so please, sound off in the comments below.

Found on Pinterest 

Here's an interactive lesson you can use with your kiddos. They will take a self assessment and then learn about their strongest learning styles. This should prove to be an invaluable tool in your teaching/tutoring repertoire!

http://www.educationworld.com

Once you AND your students have a good understanding of their learning styles, you can tailor your lessons to meet their needs. Here are a few links I've found that might help you design lessons to reach your students from their perspective!

For your spacial and kinesthetic learners kinestheticlearningstrategies.com

Have an auditory learner successfulteaching.blogspot.com

How about some ideas for your visual learners brighthubeducation.com

I learned that my oldest child is a naturalist and it was hard for me as a logical learner to find ways to accommodate her, I wish I would have found this page 10 years ago! education.jhu.edu

Do you have a go-to-site you'd like to share with us? Please post your link in the comments below!

Thanks for stopping by!

                              Stefany (Interactive Learning with Miss Stefany)