Ways to Make Student
Thinking Visible
Making Thinking Visible
Ritchhart, Morrison and Church,
2011
It’s not what we look at, but what
we see.
Thoreau
► Ritchhart,
Morrison and Church offer 21
thinking routines for making student
thinking visible. These are part of the
Harvard Cultures of Thinking Project and
are based on the premise of Authentic
Intellectual Work proposed by Fred
Neumann in 2001.
Zoom In
► Zoom
In is one way of introducing a topic
using portions of a photograph or picture to
draw student thinking out. It uses
description, inference and interpretation as
an APK at the start of a lesson or to further
explore ideas.
Example Zoom In
► What
do you see?
► What does it remind
you of?
► What
new things do you see?
► What word or phrase would you use to
describe the image?
► How
does this image change your
hypothesis about what is going on?
► When,
where or what is this piece of art
about? Does it remind you of anything?
The
Twittering
Machine by
Paul Klee,
1922
Art does not reproduce
the visible, rather it
makes visible.
Paul Klee
► Now
that the students can see the whole
image, further connections to the material
can be made.
For example, what did Klee mean by The
Twittering Machine? Is it about
industrialization? Music? The caged bird?
What does “twitter” mean to us today?
Applicable to Math
► How
is this image applicable to math?
► What shape do you see?
► Can you equate the shape to any shape or
form in the real world?
► What
other information
does this view give you?
How do the surfaces
give off a mathematical
Quality?
►
Can you tell now what the
artist is trying to convey?
Does this new information
change your perception?
► Picasso’s
Cubist
painting Still Life
With Bread
Cubism: 20th c. art form in
which objects are rendered
in geometric shapes.
What shapes can you see?
What equations can we use
to analyze the shapes?
How to Create a Zoom In
► Choose
your painting or photo
► In Microsoft Paint or other editing program crop
each piece of the painting, one at a time, and save
under a different name (1, 2, 3, etc.)
► Create your power point, adding various pieces to
the screen where they would naturally fall in the
painting to build interest and cognition
► Show the final work and discuss further
Cultures of Thinking
► http://americanart.si.edu/calendar/lectures/
archive/2011/ritchhart/
Ritchhart talk at the Smithsonian Museum –
discusses Zoom In and other techniques for
engaging and assessing student thinking.
Using Technology to Make
Thinking Visible
Bloomin Google
http://www.schrockguide.net/bloomi
n-apps.html
Search Cube
http://search-cube.com/
Glogster EDU
http://glogsteredu.edu.glogster.com/
Wordle
► www.wordle.net
To make any thinking visible, Wordle is a
good tool to use – it will bring a graphic
representation of the most used or
prominent words to the forefront of thinking
and give a graphic representation
Common Core Visibility
Headlines
► http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMginVg
sYPs
► Handout
► Activity
Formative Assessment
Hand Signals
Thumbs Up, Down, Sideways
I Have the Answer, Who Has the Question
I Used to Think….Now I Think
Write Everything You Know About xxx in 1
Minute
Accountable Talk
► http://www.wordgeneration.org/atpd2.html
► What
Makes You Say That?
► Say More About That
► Do You Agree or Disagree
► What Makes You Say That
► Who Can Repeat What …. Just Said?
Use With
► Chalk
Talk
► Mind Maps and Graphic Organizers
► Word Wall, Walls That Talk, Desks That Talk
► Socratic Discussion Groups
Resources
► Ritchhart,
Morrison, and Church. 2011.
Making Thinking Visible. Jossey-Bass. San
Francisco.
► Ron Ritchhart http://www.ronritchhart.com/Welcome.html
► Kathy Schrock http://www.schrockguide.net/bloominapps.html
► Search
Cube - http://search-cube.com/
► Glogster http://glogsteredu.edu.glogster.com
► Accountable Talk –
http://www.wordgeneration.org/atpd2.html
► Visible Thinking at Project Zero http://pzweb.harvard.edu/vt/VisibleThinking
_html_files/VisibleThinking1.html