Visual Thinking to Manage Learning

Click here to learn more about this blog series and read Part 1: Visualize Time

Click here to read Part 2: Visualize Ideas. The simple drawing activities we share in this post will set students up for success in the strategies we’re sharing here in Part 4.

Click here to catch up with Part 3: Visualize Relationships

When we started writing this blog series (click the links above to read from the beginning!), our goal was to share strategies, activities, and processes to give students choice in what they create, and also choice in how they get there. We wanted to push the concept of visual thinking beyond sketching someone else’s ideas from presentations, videos, etc. – and start using simple drawings, color, and other visual tools to help students see the work they have in front of them, develop ideas that traditional discussion and writing may not, and plan their creations in a purposeful way.

PART 4: VISUALIZE SOLUTIONS

Your students have put a ton of work into their project. They’ve set up a project management system to organize their time and set priorities. They’ve researched, interviewed, and engaged in empathy. They’ve worked through ideation activities to purposefully decide on how they will solve the problem or answer the driving question. Then, when the time comes to begin presenting their work, findings, and solution – they open a slideshow and start throwing text and images on slides – without spending any time planning their creations. The result? We get a collection of slideshows that all look the same – a slide for each section of the rubric, standard “Title and Content” slide layouts, and over-used slide design templates.

If we give students the time and support to visualize their solutions before they start creating, would their slideshows look different? Would they even end up creating a slideshow at all? Probably not.

Prototype Everything.

If you are at all familiar with design thinking, you already know that prototyping is a major step in the process. Prototyping allows designers to get their products in front of users in order to get feedback, before creating the “real thing.” Prototypes are quick, cheap, and usually conceptual. When the designers at Apple first imagined the Apple Watch, did they start by actually creating the Apple Watch and selling it to their global audience? Definitely not. Once they went through the design process and decided on wearable tech as their “solution,” a few of the engineers at Apple attached an iPhone to a velcro strap and had their colleagues wear it around the office for a week. This prototype was cheap – they already had iPhones available; quick – they didn’t waste time engineering a new product; and conceptual – they knew they wouldn’t actually put iPhones on people’s’ wrists. This allowed them to get feedback from users on essential questions like “Do people want to get notifications on a watch?” and “What features from the iPhone would be ideal on a watch, and which could we get rid of?”

We are so focused on preparing our students to work in these types of careers, but don’t always give them experiences that mirror the “real world” work that is being done. Whether they are creating presentations, videos, graphics, or physical products, using visual thinking to support students in various prototyping activities will help them organize their ideas, plan for their users, and create more authentic products.

Sometimes when Manuel and I work with students on visual thinking, they ask something like “So, why would I use visuals like this when just writing the words is faster?” That’s a fair question. It’s usually older students who ask these questions, because they have become so focused on getting work done quickly so they can move on to the next thing. We always answer with something along the lines of “Honestly, this isn’t always faster. But, for some people, using sketches and visuals can help understand and communicate in ways that writing just can’t.” However, when we get to this part – the prototyping – they see how using visuals to express and communicate their ideas is more effective than just writing them out. This is when the skeptical ones “get it.”

Sketch It Out.

3D printing has become a huge trend in education (yes, we’re calling it a trend…), leading to “3D printing projects” and other design projects where the end product is pre-determined: a 3D print. This has caused much of the focus to be on the actual 3D print itself, not on the ideas behind it. Students are making their solution fit their assigned end product, when they should be making their end product fit their solution and user needs.

Instead of going straight to the 3D printing software, start with a blank piece of paper and a pencil. This is one of Manuel’s favorite activities with students. He starts by asking students to explain their user/audience, the problems that they defined or the research they conducted, and their ideas for their product or solution. Then, he asks the student to draw a rough sketch of their idea. While they draw, they keep talking about the users needs that they explained earlier – which usually leads the students to discuss details of their sketch and label parts, things that they likely wouldn’t have done if they were simply writing a paragraph about their idea. 

Sometimes it’s hard to explain the images in our minds, but if we can say “Here, this is what I mean…” while drawing, that will lead to a deeper conversation. This labeled sketch is a prototype. It allows the students to get feedback – from the teacher or, ideally, actual users – and decide which parts of the design should be changed, and which parts of the prototype should be printed. What started as a an entirely 3D printed prosthetic arm, for example, turns into a high-quality 3D printed connector or joint that can be attached to a mostly cardboard prosthetic arm.

Be sure to check out more of Manuel’s work with prototyping with sketching and cardboard on his website: http://www.manuelsdraws.com

Wireframing.

Your students have done their research, and through ideation decided that providing a digital platform – like a website or app – would best meet the needs of their user. So often, they immediately open Google Sites or their app creator of choice, and begin entering text and graphics without much planning or organizing.

Visual communication is an extremely important skill for students (and adults!). If your app or website is hard to navigate, or hard to look at, no one is going to use. Digital design and visual communication is Sadie’s favorite thing to do with students. For apps and websites, that starts with creating a wireframe – a simple, quick visualization of your design that allows users to “test” it for understanding and functionality.

Sadie’s process for creating and testing a wireframe:

1. Start by giving students blank paper – notecards, 8.5 x 11, cardstock, whatever. They’ll need a lot of paper, because they will use a separate paper for each screen of their platform.
2. Take some time to talk about layout – navigation should be at the bottom of the screen on an app, but towards the top on the website; should text be large for your audience?; including white space and margins/gutters
3. On the first paper, students should draw out the home screen (app) or landing page (website).
   • Include: Major text like titles and headings; image placeholders (a rectangle with an X through it); video placeholders (a rectangle with a play sign); navigation buttons.
   • Don’t include: All text – just write “Description of xyz here…” with some extra straight lines to show how much space the text will take up
4. For each of the navigation buttons drawn on the home page, create a new page following the same process as Step 3. Continue this process until all pages/screens of the platform are sketched out
5. Find someone to test the prototype. Put the first page in front of the tester without saying anything. The tester should “click” a button on the navigation bar, and the corresponding page will be placed in front of them. Continue this process until the tester has navigated through the entire app/site. It’s important that the tester ask questions out loud so that the designer can get that feedback.

Once students have worked through this process, we typically have them move over to Google Slides and begin designing their app/site in a slideshow using slide linking for the navigation.

Read more about Sadie’s work around digital design and visual communication at her Design School for Educators website: http://www.designstudioedu.com

Storyboarding.

Storyboarding is very similar to wireframing – it allows students to visualize the flow and plan of a video or presentation. When planning a video, students start by writing out the script to the video – this makes sure all content is planned for before they start filming. Then, on a large 11×17 paper, draw lines to divide the paper into a gridded storyboard. We try to keep the boxes at least 2×2. Begin writing the script into the boxes, moving to a new box each time they think the scene should change. Once the script is written out, students then begin sketching the screen into each box. These sketches should be simple and quick – using notes when needed. A storyboard is another way to visualize time – allowing students to see all the work ahead, prioritize, and assign responsibilities.

Storyboarding a presentation is very similar, and follows basically the same process. However, Manuel likes to use notecards instead of a large paper. This allows him to get all of his ideas for a presentation sketched out, but gives the freedom to move slides around or add new ones along the way.

 

Storyboarding can also be used to plan out social media graphics or multi-platform campaigns!

VISUAL THINKING CHALLENGE

It’s your turn to give Visualizing Solutions a try! Grab a piece of paper and a pen. Divide the paper into 8-12 sections. Create a storyboard for your typical day – or a special event! Create this storyboard as if it were an actual movie or video someone would watch.

Do you think this would help you explain your day to someone else? Would someone have a basic understanding just by looking at your storyboard?

We want to see your work! Take a picture and tweet us @sadieclorinda and @manuelherrera33 and add #VisualThinking

 

Visual Thinking to Manage Learning

Click here to learn more about this blog series and read Part 1: Visualize Time

Click here to read Part 2: Visualize Ideas. The simple drawing activities we share in this post will set students up for success in the strategies we’re sharing here in Part 3.

PART 3: VISUALIZE RELATIONSHIPS

In this blog series, Manuel and I talked a lot about using visual thinking to help visualize your own ideas – pushing beyond using sketches to capture someone else’s presentation, podcast, etc., and using drawing to see ideas clearly and communicate your thinking to others.

In project and design work, students are generating lots of ideas as they engage in research – whether that’s through interviews, observations, or finding sources on the internet. With different types of information coming from various sources, it can be difficult for students to organize and understand all of this information, and see how things are connected. Using visual thinking, we can give our students the tools and supports to see the connections in their research and ideas, and begin to visualize relationships between people, ideas, processes, and more.

Ditch The Diagrams.

Asking students to record and outline their research and learning isn’t a new concept. We’ve likely all outlined a research paper. Graphic organizers are a popular way for students to organize information and ideas – but are they really effective in helping students synthesize information and make connections between ideas? Venn Diagrams are a popular way to compare and contrast – and have gained new life with digital tools like Google Drawing. However, the learning taking place with Venn Diagrams, and many other graphic organizers, is often low-level – students are making lists, recalling information, categorizing items, and comparing/contrasting.

Using visual thinking techniques provides structure to help students organize information, while still giving them the freedom to see all the information in front of them, synthesize that information, and draw their own conclusions. Remember, visual thinking doesn’t always have to mean drawing or sketching – visual thinking means getting ideas out so that you can better understand, organize, and communicate those ideas.

Empathy Maps. A popular component in the Empathy phase of the design thinking process, empathy maps help designers better understand the experiences, emotions, and needs of their audience. The maps are wonderful for design thinking, but can be used outside of the design process as well. When researching in history, geography, or government, students often use graphic organizers to list dates, information, and traits of different people, places, or events. Replacing those graphic organizers with empathy maps push students to go beyond making lists, and start making connections between those people, places, or events. For example, if I am researching the events leading up to the American Revolution, I could complete an empathy map for the Colonists and another for the British Soldiers – this would help me see how two different groups of people experienced, and acted upon, the same events. Click here for a printable Empathy Map.

Observation Maps. While empathy maps capture emotions and experiences, observation maps are used to capture detailed observations of people, places, or processes. The five columns of an observation map – Activities, Environments, Interactions, Objects, and Users – gives students a solid structure to capture – through simple drawing or quick notes – detailed observations and visualize connections between the things they are observing. Click here for a printable Observation Map.

Mind Mapping. We’ve all completed mind maps – we start with one concept in the middle of a paper, and lines come off that concept in spokes leading to related ideas, characteristics, etc. Like other graphic organizers, this structure is pretty straight forward – which can sometimes mean we get stuck in that structure. What if we encourage students to start with visualizing ideas, rather than starting with a structure? Start by making a “brain dump” of all the ideas, research, information, etc. that need to communicated or included in a project. This can be through sketches or notes, in any format you choose – sticky notes, notecards, a large whiteboard, etc. Then,  take a step back and look at all the information you made visual – do you see any commonalities or trends? Can you make groups or subgroups? What connections do you see among all this information? Are there any large factors that separate ideas? You might start to see a “mind map” form – but the key is that you started by getting your ideas out, and were able to visualize relationships and connections among those ideas.

Check out these amazing maps that @ajrisedorph shared from his classroom.

Visualize Connections.

As students read stories and novels, we often ask them to keep notes on the plot and characters in order to better understand complex stories. What if, instead of listing character traits, we mapped out the stories in a non-linear way? As we learn more about each character, we use icons from our visual library and quick notes to visualize those traits, and use connectors and icon combinations to show the relationships between characters and plot points.

A high school teacher I work with is using visual thinking with her students to work through the characters and places in Greek mythology. Think about how complicated those myths can be! Zeus was the king of gods, and he had four wives. He married Hera, the queen of gods, and they had two children, Ares – the god of war, and Hephaestus – the god of fire….I could continue to list names of people and try to explain how everyone is connected. Or, I could just show you this visual and spend time discussing the characters, the stories, and how they are connected.

Manuel also shares this image the students at his high school made to make sense of The Great Gatsby as they read the novel. Visualizing stories and books can be done individually, or as a group to help think through a story and understand connections.

VISUAL THINKING CHALLENGE

It’s your turn to give Visualizing Relationships a try! You can print out the empathy map linked above, or just get out a piece of paper and a pen, and dividing the paper into four equal parts. Think of a person or character from your favorite book. Complete the empathy map for that person, really thinking about not only their characteristics, but also their experiences in the story.

Do you think this would help you explain the character to someone else? Would someone have a basic understanding of person just by looking at your visuals?

We want to see your work! Take a picture and tweet us @sadieclorinda and @manuelherrera33 and add #VisualThinking

 

Visual Thinking to Manage Learning

Click here to learn more about this blog series and read Part 1: Visualize Time

PART 2: VISUALIZE IDEAS

In Part 1 of this blog series, we discussed using visual thinking to help students visualize time and better understand and organize the work in front of them within a project. Once students understand what needs to be done, and where the priorities are, how can we help them visualize the thinking and ideas that develop as they work?

You have likely heard of sketchnoting – a popular note taking format that uses drawings and icons to capture ideas from presentations, podcasts, videos, lectures, etc. Sketchnoting largely focuses on capturing and visualizing someone else’s ideas. Visual thinking goes further, and gives students tools and processes to visualize their own ideas. Sometimes this means using sketches to represent their thinking. On a larger scale, using visual thinking allows us to get our ideas and thinking out of our head so that we can see things clearly, understand how parts might fit together, and help others understand our thinking.

Stop Brainstorming. Start Visualizing.

Manuel uses notecards as part of his process to visualize his ideas. When planning a project, his ideas don’t always come to him in a linear, ordered way. Using notecards to quickly sketch or write ideas allows him to get all of his ideas out, then rearrange the notecards into a logical flow – with the flexibility to add or move the ideas around as the project develops.

How many of our students could benefit from this process? So often, students start a presentation by opening a slideshow and starting with their title slide. If given the chance to use notecards to visualize all of the ideas that will go into the slideshow, do you think their presentation would turn out differently? Would it end up being a presentation at all, or could it morph into something completely different?

This process of using notecards is simply an upgraded version of traditional brainstorming. How often, when asking students to develop ideas for a project, do we jump into a brainstorming activity? This usually looks like creating written lists, sometimes individually and sometimes as a group. While brainstorming can be productive, without a structure in place it can become very chaotic. Research shows that unstructured brainstorming in groups often discourages participation by quieter students, and doesn’t hold each individual accountable for participation. The result? Brainstorming sessions end without solving the problem at hand.

Digital tools have increased our ability to do collaborative brainstorming, but have also given us the ability to delete ideas that we don’t like or are embarrassed to share with others. In reality, some of our worst ideas can develop into the best solutions!

Ideas. Not art.

The concept of visual thinking might be intimidating to some, and students often say things like “I can’t draw” and “I’m not good at art.” It’s important to remember, and to help students understand, that visual thinking is about showing your ideas. It’s not about creating beautiful drawings, perfect banners, or intricate lettering. Walk students through this sketching activity to show them how easy it is to create visual representations of their ideas.

• On a piece of paper, draw a circle, a square, a triangle, a line, a dot, a blob. What doing this with students, you can model it, but be sure to tell them that their does not have to look like yours.
• Next, give them some simple items to visualize – a lock, a tree, a house, etc. Explain how each of these is simply a combination of those first six simple shapes they drew.
• Think about a topic in your content area that students are already familiar with – explorers, the water cycle, weather. Give them 4-6 vocabulary words and ask them to make those words visual.
• You will be amazed – some students will use those simple shapes to create an icon for each word, others will create elaborate scenes. This is where you begin to see how each student visualizes things differently – their definitions would have all been similar, but their drawings are drastically different.
• Ask them to explain their visuals to a partner – chances are you will hear explanations of those terms that are much richer than they would have been if you had asked students to write a definition and compare it with their partner

Once students are more comfortable with the practice if visual thinking, encourage – but don’t require – them to use it the next time they would typically take traditional notes. This can be during a lesson that you teach, an interview during the empathy phase of a project, or as do online research. Using visual thinking will push them beyond simply recording someone else’s ideas to representing and sharing their interpretation and thoughts on those ideas.

Ideation.

A reinvention of traditional brainstorming, ideation is the process of pushing ourselves outside our comfort zones to generate as many problems, ideas, or solutions as possible. Ideation gives us the freedom to create a large quantity of ideas without worrying about quality, then share and discuss those ideas with others.

At its core, ideation is meant to be quick and timely. This is where visual thinking plays a huge role. When we give students the tools (like the simple shapes activity above), they are much more successful when engaging in the process. Fast sketches in ideation activities, when combined with some notes, allow students to quickly get their ideas out of their head and make sense of their thoughts. Here are a few ideation techniques that we love to use with students and adults.

Paper Clip. This is a fun divergent thinking activity to help students become comfortable with creative constraint and ideation before using it within a project or with content. Start by giving students a stack of sticky notes.Tell them they will get 2 minutes to come up with as many ideas as they can, and each idea should be recorded on a sticky note. Then, give them their topic just as you start the timer – Come up with as many alternate uses for a paper clip as you can. When time runs out, you can have them compare to others in their group, share out their wildest ideas, or see who came up with the most ideas. The goal of this activity is quantity over quality, which is why we use sticky notes – they can visually see the quantity. The activity also results in a lot of laughs!

Crazy Eights. This ideation technique is one of our favorites to use when developing solutions in the design thinking process, but it can also be used as a stand-alone activity to develop project ideas, identify problems, and more! Give students a large (8.5×14 or larger) piece of paper, and have them fold it into 8 equal parts. Tell them that in each section they will quickly sketch one possible solution (or idea). They will get 30 seconds per section – they must stay in that section for the entire 30 seconds, and cannot move onto the next section early. This sometimes results in frustration from students, or they feel uncomfortable because they run out of ideas and aren’t drawing anything. However, that’s when the magic happens – that discomfort that is created by creative constraint often develops the best ideas! Click here for the slides Manuel and Sadie use when facilitating Crazy Eights.

Bad Ideas. The Bad Idea Factory is a great activity when students – or adults! – are truly “stuck” and can’t generate more ideas or solutions. Asking teams for their “worst” ideas or solutions gives them the freedom to be silly, and terrible ideas will flow! For each team, have students generate as many “bad ideas” or “bad solutions” as they can on individual notecards. Then, have the team randomly draw the notecards and discuss the bad idea – why is it bad? What would happen if we implemented this idea? How would our audience feel? Through these conversations, students will begin to develop new ideas that take them to a great solution!

Four Scribbles. Have students fold a piece of paper into four squares. In each square, give them five seconds to quickly make a scribble. Then, beginning with their first scribble, give them 60-90 seconds to turn that scribble into something that could solve their problem. This activity can be difficult, but really pushes students to see things in a new way.

VISUAL THINKING CHALLENGE

It’s your turn to give Visualizing Ideas a try! Get out a piece of paper and a pen, pencil, or some markers. Start by completing the Simple Shapes activity – draw a draw a circle, a square, a triangle, a line, a dot, a blob. Then, think about a topic that you teach – it can be something simple or something complex. Write 4-6 terms related to that topic. Using combinations of those simple shapes, visualize your definition, description, or thoughts about each of those terms.

Do you think this would help you explain the terms to someone else? Would someone have a basic understanding of the term just by looking at your visuals?

We want to see your work! Take a picture and tweet us @sadieclorinda and @manuelherrera33 and add #VisualThinking

 

 

Visual Thinking to Manage Learning

Part 1: Visualize Time

Over the last couple of years, there has been a huge shift in education toward fostering critical thinking, problem solving, and creativity in our students. Students are engaging in project based learning, design thinking, and other activities that push students beyond worksheets and memorization, and encourage them to create and present their work.

When we give students choice in what they create, are we also giving them a choice in how they get there? So often, students are given a rubric and a due date, but aren’t always given the tools and processes they need to support them in managing their time, responsibilities, and planning as they move through a project.

Visual thinking can help students see the work they have in front of them, develop ideas that traditional discussion and writing may not, and plan their creations in a purposeful way. Visual thinking is a way to show thinking using images in order to better organize and understand concepts, and goes far beyond sketching and drawing to quickly take notes. In a recent study published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, researchers found that drawing, when compared to writing and listening, results in better recall of words and ideas due to the process of creating an original image when using visual thinking.  In this blog series, Manuel Herrera and I will share strategies, structures, and resources to help your students manage their learning through Visualizing Time, Ideas, Relationships, and Solutions.

 

VISUALIZE TIME

If you have spent any time in an elementary school classroom, you’ve likely noticed visual schedules displayed for the class to see. These schedules highlight each component of the day with a word and icon – like the word “Reading” with a cartoon picture of a book. The combination of words and icons makes the schedule accessible to all of our learners, and the way the schedule is displayed helps the students see the whole process of their day and make sense of what comes next. However, visualizing time and schedules typically stops after elementary school. Is making time visual any less valuable to older students or adults? Or do we just assume that they are capable of managing their own time?

 

Project management is a valuable skill for students of all grade levels to learn, but many projects are still designed with the teacher in the role of Project Manager – directing the learning experience and making many of the decisions. Putting students in the role of project manager, and supporting them in the process of identifying tasks, assigning responsibilities, and choosing how they work will help them understand the work that is in front of them, and give them an organized way to work through it.

Timelines

Traditional project management logs – digital or printed – typically consist of a multi-column table, where students can write a task list in one column, responsibilities in another column, with columns for due dates, updates, etc. for older students. Each row usually has a checkbox so that each task can be “crossed off” as it’s completed.

Task lists and to-do lists are a great way to generate ideas about all of the work included in a large project – but this is where project management should start, not where it should end. A task list is simply a list of work to be done, and doesn’t do a great job of helping students understand how to actually prioritize those tasks.

Taking a task list and turning it into a visual timeline helps students not only see what work needs to be done, but go further and see the relationships between tasks, and how responsibilities and priorities can overlap. A vertical task list that only includes the work to be done can be very overwhelming to students (and adults!), and can lead to procrastination and last-minute work. Visualizing a large project helps students break things down into smaller chunks, and understand which items should take priority and advanced planning, helping them move through their project more efficiently and effectively.

Supporting Students in Visualizing Time

Practice First. When Manuel and I use timelines with students, we never introduce the concept of visualizing time within the project. We always start with a comfortable topic for students, so that their focus can be on how to visualize time. Take 20 minutes and ask students to use quick drawings and words to create a timeline of a task or process they often complete – their morning routine, sports practices, a task they complete at work, etc.

Big Paper. Any time we do visual thinking activities with students, we always give them 11×17 copy paper. This gives them the freedom to spread their drawings out and not worry about how to manage the space.

Flexible Timelines. In any project – from creating animal habitats in 1st grade through forensics in high school – there has to be a level of flexibility. Sometimes checkpoints and deadlines get pushed, new responsibilities are added, or certain portions of a project are taking longer than expected. Sticky notes are a simple way to allow flexibility in a project plan. Sketching tasks onto sticky notes, then arranging those onto a larger timeline allows students to move tasks around and add items as needed. I love these full-adhesive sticky notes that lay flat on paper.

Class Timelines. In younger grades, project management can be done as a whole class. Create a large timeline on bulletin board paper, and let students sketch out the tasks on larger sticky notes and place them on the timeline. Create a “We are here” marker and move it along as the class progresses through the project – this allows students to visually understand where they are in the project, what is coming next, and celebrate the work they have completed! These large sticky notes are great for young students to visualize ideas.

Use Color. Simply adding color to icons, sketches, and notes can be a powerful tool in helping students manage their time. When working collaboratively, students can assign color to each person on a project team. All of Sadie’s responsibilities are written in purple, or are on purple sticky notes, and all of Manuel’s tasks are in blue. Both the team and the teacher can quickly see how they work is divided, and if all team members are completing their responsibilities.

For individual project work, color can be used to create a visual hierarchy – assign red to high-priority tasks, green to low priority tasks. Yellow can be used for any new work added mid-project.

VISUAL THINKING CHALLENGE

It’s your turn to give Visualizing Time a try! Get out a piece of paper a pen, pencil, or some markers. Think about a project that you are currently working or have coming up – it can be big or small, personal or professional. Using a combination of icons and words, create a timeline or “visual schedule” that helps you see the work you have ahead. Think of ways you could show how some tasks take priority, or add details about timing, responsibilities, etc.

Did this challenge help you understand your project better than a traditional task list?

We want to see your work! Take a picture and tweet us @sadieclorinda and @manuelherrera33 and add #VisualThinking

 

 

CLICK HERE TO READ PART 2: VISUALIZE IDEAS 

Connecting Teachers

In my position this year, I have spent a LOT of time in buildings. Sitting down with teachers to plan lessons, brainstorm new ideas, and co-teaching lessons.

The biggest thing I have noticed this year is that teachers so often work in “silos.” They focus on their classroom and their kiddos (nothing wrong with that), and do lots of work themselves that could probably easily be shared. Continue reading →