• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Blog
  • Podcast
  • Course
    • Teaching Every Reader
  • Subscriber Freebies
  • About
  • Contact
  • Shop
  • Member Login

The Measured Mom

Education resources for parents and teachers

  • Alphabet
  • Reading
    • Structured literacy
    • Printable Books
    • Pre-Reading
    • Phonics
    • Sight Words
    • Comprehension
    • Fluency
    • Vocabulary
  • Writing
    • Grammar
    • Handwriting
    • Spelling
    • Writing in Pre-K
    • Writing in K-3
  • Math
    • Counting
    • Number Recognition
    • Addition & Subtraction
    • Colors, Shapes & Patterns
    • Visual Discrimination
    • Time, Money & Measurement
    • Place Value
    • Graphs
    • Multiplication & Division
    • Fractions
    • Problem Solving
  • Book Lists
    • Letter of the Week
    • Early Childhood Themes
    • Pre-Reading Skills
    • Math Concepts
    • Writing Mentor Texts
    • Versions of Familiar Tales
    • Holidays and Seasonal
    • History
    • Leveled Book Lists
  • Join Membership
Home
  • Shop
  • Blog
    • Alphabet
    • Reading
    • Writing
    • Math
    • Book Lists
  • Podcast
  • Courses
    • Teaching Every Reader
    • Teaching Every Writer
  • Subscriber Freebies
  • About
  • Membership
  • Contact

PSPKK1231 Comment

Visualizing with picture books

This post contains affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Sharing is caring!

  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Today’s post will show you how to teach visualizing with picture books! This post contains affiliate links.

Today I’m sharing another way to teach comprehension strategies with picture books. It’s part of the collaborative blog series that I’m doing with This Reading Mama.

Up next?

Visualizing!

Visualizing is the ability to hear (or read) a story and have a mental image of the text.

I grabbed a copy of the word-rich book, Owl Moon, by Jane Yolen. Then I created a simple printable for my second grader to record his visualizations.

Before we began, I talked to him about the word “visualize” and what it means. “Do you think that visualize has to do with hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, or touching?” He wasn’t sure, so I told him that it has to do with what you see. “Visualizing is what you see in your mind.”

On his own, he made the connection, “It’s like the word visor.”

“That’s right! When you see vis at the beginning of a word, it has to do with sight. It’s important to have a picture of what you read in your mind, because that helps you understand the story better. When I read you a chapter book without pictures, you visualize. But you can also visualize when you listen to a picture book.”

I read each page in the book aloud, one by one. As I read, I stopped to pick out phrases or sentences that created a vivid picture in my mind.


To demonstrate the strategy, I picked a strong sentence from the text.

“The trees stood still as giant statues.”

I copied it onto the printable and illustrated it.

We continued reading through the text. This time my second grader chose the strong sentences, recorded them, and illustrated them.

I would recommend using this strategy as a class multiple times before asking students to do it on their own. One thing you can do is give each student a clip board with a stack of sticky notes or note paper. Stop at pre-determined points in a whole class read aloud (either a picture or chapter book) for students to illustrate what they see in their minds. Then they can share their pictures with classmates.

P.S. Visualizing works especially well with poetry! See this post from This Reading Mama for a printable pack: Visualizing with Poetry

Other ways to teach visualizing:

  • Read a poem aloud to your students. Have them each illustrate the poem without looking at other students’ pictures. Then have them share pictures to see that everyone visualizes differently.
  • Put a stuffed animal in a bag. Have students put their hands in the bag to feel the animal. Then have them draw to show what they visualized.
  • Encourage students to have a movie in their mind as they read. If the movie stops, it means comprehension has broken down. They need to go back and reread.

JOIN THOUSANDS OF HAPPY EDUCATORS!

Members of The Measured Mom Plus get access to even more printables … including a growing library of reading comprehension passages!

JOIN THE MEMBERSHIP TODAY!

Get your free visualizing worksheet!

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD

Free Reading Printables for Pre-K-3rd Grade

Join our email list and get this sample pack of time-saving resources from our membership site! You'll get phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading comprehension resources ... all free!

Sharing is caring!

  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Filed Under: Reading, Comprehension Tagged With: first grade, second grade, kindergarten

You May Also Enjoy These Posts:

R-controlled vowel words game 5 things kids need… before they’re ready to sound out words Worksheets for short a words
Free Games for Ending Blends
5 Tips for teaching the alphabet

Reader Interactions

Trackbacks

  1. Comprehension Reading Strategies with Picture Books - This Reading Mama says:
    May 23, 2018 at 6:39 am

    […] Visualizing {The Measured Mom} […]

    Reply to this comment

Leave a Comment Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

Grade Level Key

  • PS Preschool (ages 2-3 years)
  • PK Pre-K (ages 4-5 years)
  • K Kindergarten
  • 1 1st grade
  • 2 2nd grade
  • 3 3rd grade

Hello, I’m Anna!

Welcome to The Measured Mom. I’m so glad you’re here!

Meet Our Team

Free Reading Printables for Pre-K-3rd Grade

Join our email list and get this sample pack of time-saving resources from our membership site! You'll get phonemic awareness, phonics, and reading comprehension resources ... all free!

Shop these popular reading resources!

Editable Reading Games for Every Season – MEGA PACK!

$24.00

Phonics Books & Games – Complete Set

$49.00

Reading response sheets & Early chapter book lists

$18.00

Shop All Resources

Members get more!

The Measured Mom Plus is the perfect online membership for Pre-K to third grade educators.

Learn More

Love Freebies?

Subscribing to our email newsletter is completely free. And when you do, you'll get access to our library of subscriber freebies! Sign up below to get access to a wonderful variety of math and literacy resources.

Join our online course and get the tools you need to teach every learner in K-2!

Confidently teach every reader in your classroom. Still have time to live your life.

Learn More

Listen and subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, and Stitcher

Check out these recent podcast episodes:

  • What does the research say about alphabet instruction? with Dr. Shayne Piasta
  • What is set for variability? A conversation with Dr. Marnie Ginsberg
  • How to help students improve language comprehension – a conversation with Dr. Karen Dudek-Brannan
More Episodes

Check out these FREE email courses...

Get strategies and tools to teach a particular topic with a free 5-day email series! Just click an image to sign up. We recommend signing up for just one at a time.

For Pre-K Educators

How to teach phonological & phonemic awareness

How to teach phonological & phonemic awareness

Learn how to develop this important pre-reading skill with a free 5-day email series!

How to teach preschool math

How to teach preschool math

Learn exactly what to teach your preschoolers in this free 5-day series!

For Kinder & 1st Grade Educators

How to teach kids to sound out words

How to teach kids to sound out words

Learn my top strategies for teaching kids to "sound it out"

How to teach sight words

How to teach sight words

Get strategies and tools for teaching sight words to young learners!

Tips for teaching phonics

Tips for teaching phonics

Sign up for our free 5-day email series to learn what phonics skills to teach and how to structure your phonics lessons!

For 2nd & 3rd Grade Educators

How to build reading fluency

How to build reading fluency

Learn smart strategies for helping your learners become fluent readers with this free 5-day series!

How to build reading comprehension

How to build reading comprehension

Discover the essential reading comprehension strategies for 2nd & 3rd grade and how to teach them!

“Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” –Matthew 6:33

Copyright © 2023 The Measured Mom •  All rights reserved  •  Privacy & Disclosure Statement  •  Site Design by Emily White Designs