Imagery in Creative Writing

TIPC Ratings

Students were guided through the Van Allsburg web site to investigate the strategies Chris Van Allsburg utilized for creative writing, drawing, and inference on moral lessons. Emphasis was modeled on his imagery writing and his inference for students to acquire and evaluate imagery; and inferred themes. These strategies were selected to challenge students to synthesize and create their own imagery character, setting and themes using Van Allsburg’s style of writing after the research. Examples were provided for each element and discussed thoroughly. In the research process, the teacher assessed groups to ensure information was interactive.

Students:
After the student-formed collaborative groups read and evaluated the books, groups assembled and organized the stories key elements to garner information. Students used problem-solving techniques to select appropriate information as they researched and assembled the information for the key elements in characters and settings and inferred themes. Students completed the task as they choose appropriate digital tools to display their information. Once students began the brainstorming, groups applied the information collected to create their own imagery for a new character, setting and theme.

Students organized teams and group roles to communicate and collaborate with peers using digital tools as they evaluated stories and garnered information for key elements in the Van Allsburg stories. The groups were able to discuss with their peers, ideas both for the setting, theme and characters as they practiced these new techniques. During research, each team had students who read the story while one person typed as the students discussed the key elements in the story. The groups continued to work together as they brainstormed their ideas for the imagery characters, setting and morals for their new stories. Students used their choice of digital tools such as Google Docs or Google Power Points for collaboration

Students used higher order thinking to transfer their prior and new knowledge to design their own characters, setting and themes from the images and quotes from Holman Middle School. The lesson was set to model a range of approaching critical thinking for problem solving as students read the Van Allsburg books and identified the key elements of Van Allsburg’s style within the books. Students used critical thinking and decision making as they brainstormed for new stories using a new style of writing.

Students at the beginning of the lesson analyzed the key elements and made predictions based on the Van Allsburg stories that led students to create their own original short stories. Using Van Allsburg’s inspiration of his style of writing; students continued to self-generate new ideas for a setting, character and them. As students self-generated idea in pairs, the work began to take on new meaning depending on the ability of the student. Taking all the key elements and creating new ideas in collaboration with other peers’ work took the assignment into new parameters from analyzing and evaluating to creativity and innovation. Students began to reflect on the difficulty of creativity and innovative process of not only writing new stories but developing a new style from a famous author.