Yesterday I shared some beginning thoughts about making learning and thinking visible. The power of being able to get pictures of our students’ thinking in powerful. It provides us with valuable insight into their understandings and misconceptions.
As we study Mildred Taylor’s brilliant novel, “Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry”, I’ve invited the kids to keep tracks of their thinking. Some use post-it notes or their reader/writer notebook. Others choose to follow along in their own copy of the book.
The two images above were created by Macey, a fifth grader in my class and an extraordinarily gifted artist. She decided to document her thinking using a new tool in our classroom; it is called a “Rocket Wave Notebook” and it allows the user to create analog notes or pictures, convert them into digital images and send them to a variety of digital spaces. These “tracks of thinking” can now be uploaded to Macey’s digital portfolio as evidence of her relationship with the written word.
Relationship with the written word.
The ultimate goal, wouldn’t you say?