Add Some 'Sense' To The Images (Lesson 1 of 4)

• Little Red Riding Hood and the Sweet Little Wolf* by Rachael Mortimer
•  Lesson vocabulary words from the Reading/Writing word wall: version, imaging**, beginning, middle, end
• 'Imaging/Visualizing' Poster (I'll be adding to this chart throughout my imaging/visualizing unit)
• colored copy paper (optional)
• Set up the whiteboard
• large chart paper for the lesson

This is the first version of 3 books about Little Red Riding Hood that we will ultimately be comparing. For this first lesson, I am really leading the students through the activity because of the vocabulary level. Choosing good descriptive words is VERY difficult for my students (beyond 'good' and 'bad') and I want them to bolster that vocabulary and become more independent as we move through more versions of the stories. I will set up the events in a beginning/middle/end organizer so we can compare later, as well have the kids complete a description of the characters for comparison later.

The later lessons are Red Riding Hood Smelled Like Apples (Lesson 2 of 4),  Images Have A Voice (lesson 3 of 4) and Wanted.. One Big Bad... (Lesson 4 of 4).

I chose this book because it was fairly easy to understand. It basically gives a different motivation for the wolf and reasons why he acted as he did. It has a sweet ending and is a nice comparison to some of the more difficult texts that we read later from a different country.

"Imaging" is the term that my district uses for "visualizing". In order to stay true to the district expectations, I'll continue to use this verbage. Visualizing is a critical skill for 2nd graders because they need to 'go deeper' in the text. By visualizing as they read, they are creating and tweaking images in their minds as they actively read. This kind of 'close reading', forming images using text, verifying and changing those images, and ultimately comparing their images to the author, creates critical readers and deepens comprehension.

Underlined words below are lesson vocabulary words that are emphasized and written on sentence strips for my Reading & Writing word wall. I pull off the words off the wall for each lesson, helping students understand this key 'reading and writing' vocabulary can be generalized across texts and topics.  The focus on acquiring and using these words is part of a shift in the Common Core Standards towards building students’ academic vocabulary.  My words are color coded ‘pink’ for literature/’blue’ for reading strategies/’orange’ for informational text/'yellow' for writing/’green’ for all other words)

Common starting point

• Show images of an original Little Red Riding Hood story and review what happens.
• Make a list of descriptive words for the girl and wolf - 
• "Let's list the 5 senses and some feeling words that might describe these characters.
• "Today I have a different version of a Little Red Riding Hood story.  We're going to use a new strategy called imaging to help us understand better."

Give the purpose of the lesson

• "When we use imaging, we create a picture in our mind and then talk about which words from the book helped you "draw" your picture."
• "When are you creating pictures?  Yes, all the time... I'll write on the 'Imaging/visualizing Strategy' chart:
• We use imaging before, during, and after reading.
• "When we create an image, we use our senses - sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell - to make a good picture. We can also think about feelings - how does the character feel."
• "Today we'll use imaging in the beginning, middle, and end of the story to help us understand the story better and be an 'active reader'."

Introduce strategy - teacher models

• Begin by reading the title (DON'T SHOW THE COVER). Pause and share the image you've created in your mind, and talk about which words from the book helped you "draw" your picture. Go back to the description list - which words describe how the character feels and how the image looks, smells, tastes, sounds like, and feels like?"  Here's the image that I drew.  Show the cover after you draw.
• Talk about how these words help you create an image - called imaging. This is the modeling technique that I used to start the imaging.
• Continue reading the first 2 pages and don't show the picture ('once upon at time'). Pause again and draw the new image you created. Write some words to show what you see, hear, taste, smell and feel. Show the picture when you're done and put it on the large chart for the first 'beginning' picture.

As we describe these characters, I help students look to the text and infer how the characters respond to major events and challenges. (RL.2.3) The Common Core Standards encourages teachers to model this skill and help develop a level of rigor for students to be able to perform in terms of their ability to articulate important details about text elements.

Guided practice - work with the students

• Read and show picture for the next 4 pages but cover the pictures as you read for the page 'So Sweet Little Wolf set out.'
• Share your images and ask for ideas from the students.  Add to feeling vocabulary list associated with what you see. Put that on the large chart for the 2nd 'beginning' picture.
• "Do you think our images would be identical? Probably not! This is a great time to talk about why your images might be different.  "Our experiences and background knowledge change the way we create the picture in our minds."
• Read through the page that says 'It was a fairy tale!"  Hide the picture and draw an image on the board. Attach some descriptive and feeling words.  This was the whiteboard when we were done and how I explained my image. I used this picture for the first 'middle' picture.

Assign Task

• "I'm going to read through the story and I'll stop and cover some pages so you can  imaging to create a picture. You'll be active readers because you'll be thinking and then comparing to the author's illustrations." 
• "Write your descriptive words around the picture so we know what senses you are using to create it."
• This is an example of my technique for last page.

I just chose a students' picture at random and put it on the large chart. We created one large class chart for this lesson.

Formative Assessment

•  As students work, walk around and ask them to explain how they chose their pictures.
• If they add details to their pictures that were not in the book, ask them how they chose those images. Here is a student explaining her images.
• These are some extra images that my kids created.

When you preview the book and think about your class's ability, I will leave it up to you which pages to stop on and how often to have the kids use imaging. My kids needed more prompting so I stopped after every few pages, but did still remind them of details that I had read, gave them ideas of what to draw and helped, in general. I expect they will improve as we continue to practice this skill. Second graders typically do not always have a lot of confidence about their reading and ability to form images, especially comparing them to the author.  As we continue to compare author's versions of these fairy tales from other countries or perspectives (RL.2.9), they will see that there are different interpretations and no 'right answer', which should improve their confidence. I think that's why the Common Core Standards include this focus area. As students critically compare works on similar topics, they realize that perspectives vary and they should be open to different interpretations of stories.

Reflect on what you know

• Ask students to describe the beginning, middle and end of the story based on the pictures. "How did the imaging help you?  Did you remember more because you made a picture in your head? As you thought of feeling words and senses words to describe the pictures, you are doing 'close reading' - actively reading the text and thinking about what you are reading!"
• Here's how my students described the beginning, middle and end.
• This discussion was a great follow up completing the chart paper project as a group.

Scaffolding and Special Education: This lesson could be easily scaffolded up or down, depending on student ability.

This lesson could be taught to students with academic challenges because it is mostly drawing and discussion. I did read the story aloud because of the text level. When they were thinking of feeling words, I kept a list on the board that they could reference for spelling.

Students with greater academic ability should be able to use higher level vocabulary to describe the feelings and senses. We had a good time going beyond 'good' and 'bad' to 'exciting', 'wicked', 'dastardly', and 'fabulous'.