I was supposed to be finishing my whole house cleaning and organization today! Oooops…after a long night of nearly NO sleep (due to the cutest owls ever) and a sick little owlet who needed some TLC in the wee hours of the morning, I haven’t exactly mustered the motivation necessary to get up and moving and find my bootstraps just yet. Ahhh, there’s still time!! For now, I am happy to bring you my next set of resources. Many of you may know I am a big fan of visuals. Aside from Universal Design for Learning standards, visual learning styles and the vast amount of evidence-based practice research that supports using visuals to increase communication competence and independence… well, here’s what I know. THEY JUST WORK. I’ve learned the theory, I’ve read the standards, I’ve seen the research and I’ve experienced the undeniable success first-hand, over and over and over. Are you using visual supports in your therapy room? In your classroom? With your whole class or only certain students? I challenge you to incorporate as many visuals as possible with ALL of your students. Here are a couple that you can use to help your students become more aware of their thinking, their self-reflection and their self-advocacy skills:
Road to Success Visual – With the implementation of Common Core Standards, it is now even more important to help students become independent thinkers and learners. Need a way for students to participate more in their learning and reflect on their progress? Increase student independence and help students persevere when “the road gets rough” with this Road to Success visual tool. This tool will also help students to advocate for themselves during instruction or independent work in a positive way. You can also use this tool to provide teacher feedback with a simple gesture without interrupting the flow of your teaching (pointing to yellow on the stoplight to indicate, “I know it’s hard, but keep trying.” ) Simple visual tools like this one become very powerful in the classroom!
The download also includes a printable with three visuals on the page — just cut out and laminate, then tape on each student’s desk for individualized feedback/student reflection.
Next, you will definitely want this visual tool created to increase students’ metacognitive skills. What are metacognitive skills??? Essentially, “thinking about one’s own thinking.” It is an important skill to develop in students for academic reasons, but also so that they will be successful in LIFE. To be successful in any situation, it is important to be aware of what you KNOW and what you DON’T KNOW. Start developing this critical thinking skill NOW using this visual that can be applied to any subject area – reading for learning, reading for memory, reading for enjoyment, mental math, basic math functions, independent seatwork, collaborative groups, and the list goes on!!! Read more about metacognition at education.com (for starters — this is a big buzz word and there is a growing amount of research and instructional materials dedicated to this area of cognitive skill.)
Laminate this visual and place on each student’s desk, make copies to post at learning centers or in 100 Book Challenge or reading folders, blow up to poster size to use as a visual/anchor chart…and more! Increase student indpendence by encouraging learners to become part of the evaluation process.
I hope you are finding these materials useful. I would love your feedback about the types of resources you would like to see, your impressions of my current pricing (I am new and apparently have a bit to learn in this area) and any other feedback you would be willing to share. Feel free to leave a comment or email me at lisa@livespeaklove.com.
Thank you!
~Lisa
