Super Fun Read Aloud for Visualizing with The Purple Kangaroo!
One of my favorite reading strategies to teach my kiddos is Visualizing or making mental images. This book is such a fun read-aloud for visualizing! In my opinion that is what makes reading so great! YOU get to create the pictures in your head!
This book is EPIC read aloud for visualizing or making mental images!
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Why teach Making Mental Images or Visualizing?
In my opinion, this is the reading strategy that makes reading so much fun! I always tell my students that they are making a movie in their heads. If they don’t “see” what is happening or all of a sudden the picture in their mind doesn’t make sense, they need to go back and fix up something! This is a great strategy for comprehension and helps students to monitor their own reading and recognize when meaning breaks down.
How do you teach students to Make Mental Images?
I always start with something simple. I ask the kiddos to close their eyes and think about their bedroom. Start by picturing your bed. What is on your bed? Is it made or messy? What is on the floor? Etc… Then, they tell their friends or partner about their room. Most students already visualize when they are reading, they just don’t know that they are! We talk a lot about what kinds of things help us to visualize.
Read Aloud for Visualizing or Making Mental Images: The Purple Kangaroo!
This book is AWESOME! The narrator of this book is a monkey who claims he can read your mind! The book starts with the monkey asking the reader to imagine the most spectacular thing in history!
Then, in his search for his best friend Ernesto, he describes the most wonderful, active, exciting purple kangaroo! If that wasn’t what you were thinking about, to begin with, by the end of the book, that is the only thing you are thinking of!
I just read this book yesterday and my kiddos exploded into applause and begged me to read it again! You can check out the author reading an excerpt here:
Your students can’t help but make pictures in their minds of the amazing purple kangaroo described in this book!
I have made a little freebie to go with this gem! Before you even introduce this book, I would start by prompting the kiddos to imagine (and draw) the most spectacular thing that they can think of!
Then, I would have them draw what they are thinking about after reading the story!
If you don’t have the book and would like to get your own, you can find it here (this is an affiliate link):
The link above is an Amazon Affiliate link. If you would like to get your own copy you can click the link and go straight to Amazon. If you make a purchase from Amazon I will receive a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you for your support!
Now! The Visualizing Freebie!
I have included 2 pages. One for doing a before reading sketch of what they are thinking and an after reading sketch. The other page is for just an after-reading sketch of their visualization. You can find them here:
What are your favorite Mentor Texts for teaching Visualizing?
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Don’t lose this post! Pin the image below!
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Looking for more ideas about teaching Visualizing or Making Mental Images? I did a few other posts on this topic! You can find them HERE and HERE! Happy Teaching!
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