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Reading Teacher.
http://www.jstor.org
Anne Nielsen Hibbing
Joan L. Rankin-Erickson
A re is worth a
pictu
Thisarticlediscusses teacher thousand words:
and studentdrawings
in theclassroom, illustrations visual images
Using
Intexts,picturebooks,
andmovies as external to improve
image-based tools that
supportreading comprehension
for
comprehension.
middle school
readers
struggling
e are surrounded by visual im In my textbooks when they show pictures
agery through television, movies, it helps me see what they are talking about.
videos, computers, and illustrated
w If you look at a picture, it puts more ideas
texts. The use of these sources of images is
in your head.
obvious as one walks through a school.
Classrooms in the United States often have com If you have a picture itmay take a thou
and VCRs. School class sand words to get the true meaning of the
puters, televisions,
rooms, media centers, and computer labs are picture.
filled with visual images. Unfortunately this These statements indicate the students' under
bombardment of visual images does not neces
standing of the supportive roles pictures play in
sarily transfer to students' ability to create men them understand what they read.
helping
tal images that support reading comprehension. We noticed that many of our reluctant and
We have found that our students who lack the readers with comprehension difficul
low-ability
ability to create visual images when reading of ties were not able to describe the pictures in their
ten experience comprehension difficulties. For minds as they read. Over our years of teaching
these students the adage "A picture is worth a we've had several students who claimed to "see
thousand words" is particularly relevant as they
nothing" as a result of their reading. This is not
maneuver their way through the informational
surprising given the issues faced by many of our
maze of learning from text. We asked our stu limited vocabulary, little
students, specifically,
dents to reflect upon that quote and write their
background knowledge about many topics, lack
thoughts in their journals. These middle school of understanding of the relationships represent
reluctant readers responded with comments such ed in the language of the text, and lack of aware
as the following (all comments are presented as ness that attempting to visualize what is
written by students): are con
happening might be helpful. Students
A picture helps me by showing what's go fronted regularly with the continuous images of
ing on. television or video that create the visual
The Reading Teacher Vol. 56, No. 8 May 2003 ReadingAssociation (pp. 758-770)
?2003 International
representation for them. Students may become dogs on a grill), a visual image of a context
dependent on the action sequence of images be where hot dogs have been eaten (the baseball
cause these images provide a concrete represen game when my son's team lost), emotional re
tation of actions, ideas, time, and space. Gaining sponses related to an event that included hot
meaning from an action sequence, as in televi dogs (the disappointment team parents shared
sion or video, is very different than using one's watching their sons leave the field), or other non
own concrete external experiences to create in linguistic images associated with hot dog.
ternal visual images that support comprehension. According to dual-coding theory, it is possible to
As we have paid close have nonverbal images only or images that also
scholar-practitioners,
attention to the development of imagery skills include associated words.
in our students. We have noticed that the strate The concept of dual coding, or the coding
of knowledge in both verbal and nonverbal
gic use of visual material can enhance reading rep
for reluctant and low-ability read resentations, suggests that the elements of both
experiences
ers and, indeed, can help them become more pro systems are intricately connected. This connec
ficient creators of internal visual imagery that tion between the verbal and nonverbal coding
supports comprehension. In this article we dis systems allows us to create images when we hear
cuss instructional
tools appropriate for middle words and to generate names or descriptions of
level students that use external visual images to things we see in pictures. In fact, there is some
build comprehension and are supported by the evidence that successful readers do this automat
research on mental imagery. We present a sum ically and that the inability to make verbal and
nonverbal connections quickly and efficiently is
mary of points practitioners will want to consid
er when using related to learning disabilities (Swanson, 1989).
sketches, illustrations, picture
and movies with reluctant and low-ability We have observed that creating a mental im
books,
middle school readers. age of what a
is read is natural process for our
more proficient readers. In fact, when images do
not come easily to our proficient readers, they see
Pictures in themind?Mental it as a warning that there is a breakdown in com
imagery prehension and are aware of the need to use a fix
The role of imagery in making sense of text
up strategy (e.g., reread, adjust rate of reading,
has its theoretical roots in the work of Allan
refocus). In contrast, many of the low-ability and
Paivio and his colleagues (Clark& Paivio, 1991; reluctant readers with whom we have worked do
Paivio, 1971, 1983, 1986; Sadoski, Paivio, & not automatically create images or are unable to
Goetz, 1991). From this perspective, knowledge do so even with conscious effort. Rather than cre
is represented both verbally and nonverbally in
ating images associated with meaning, many of
what is referred to as a dual-coding system, in our struggling readers are focusing on the decod
cluding both verbal and nonverbal representa ing of words. When asked about the reading that
tions of knowledge. Verbal representations of he had just completed, Shaun (pseudonym) put it
knowledge are composed of words (the verbal this way, "I don't know what happened, Iwas too
code) for objects, events, and ideas. The imagery busy reading the words."
or nonverbal system represents knowledge in The more we encountered students like
"nonverbal representations that retain some re Shaun, the more we became aware of the spe
semblance to the perceptions giving rise to cific challenges faced by our low-ability readers.
them" (Pressley & McCormick, 1995, p. 71). Shaun happened to have difficulty with compre
For example, the words hot dog may evoke a se hension because he labored at decoding. In con
ries of verbal representations? "something you trast, some students read the words fluently but
eat in a bun," "made of ground animal parts," still lacked the ability to create mental images
"high in preservatives," and so on. Hot dog may that related to the text. In cases like this, there
also evoke nonverbal images that share some may be problems in the verbal or nonverbal cod
features with the actual perception or experience. ing systems or their ability to function in an in
Nonverbal images may include a visual image of tegrated fashion. Consequently, connections
a particular hot dog (the one I drooled over yes between words and images may not be made,
terday), an olfactory image (the smell of hot thus putting comprehension at risk.
prompting students to use imagery and verbal read, but her image of saucer was tied to outer
elaboration has a powerful effect on learning and space and not to dishes. We observed another
For greatest benefits, the type of instance of confusion due to lack of experience
remembering.
needs to be related to the age of the when Teyen (pseudonym), a student whose first
prompting
learner. Younger learners may need demonstra language was not English, looked bewildered af
ter reading "They gave up the firewood business
tions, whereas older learners may require "try
instructions only. Suzuki also found after Hal got his Caterpillar paid off from A
to-imagine"
evidence that even the most proficient older ado Killing Freeze (Hall, 1988, p. 94). The student
lescent readers may need help in transferring said it did not make sense, "because a caterpillar
from one task requiring im is a fuzzy worm before it turns into a butterfly."
strategic behavior
to other tasks After Teyen was shown a picture of a Caterpillar
agery requiring imagery.
tractor he could resume his reading with under
standing. These students were aware of the "sta
Television in themind?A strategy tic" caused by mental pictures that did not make
for imaging sense and, unlike many reluctant readers, asked
As teachers of reluctant and low-ability for clarification.
readers, we have encountered students who lack Our reluctant and struggling readers often
the ability to create pictures in their minds. felt they had read when their eyes had passed
Therefore, we have incorporated several strate over the words. This type of reading can result in
gies to help students become aware of the imag the lack of a picture or a fuzzy picture on the
ing process. One strategy we use is an analogy of mental TV screen. When students become aware
a television in the mind. This analogy helps stu of the lack of an image or "static" from a current
dents to realize that there should be more going
image, they can then be taught to use fix-up
on in the reading process than just "barking the
strategies such as changing their rate, rereading,
words." We talk about the television screen that or
refocusing attention, asking for clarification
we "watch" as we read, and we use think-alouds to overcome the confusion. The ability to regain
to talk about the pictures on our mental screen an image related to the text becomes an indication
as we read. We emphasize the need for the pic that comprehension is back on track. The re
tures to match the words. We explain that when search on mental 1981) con
imagery (Gambrell,
the pictures and words do not match (e.g., a stu firms that students may need to be prompted
dent's mind wanders to picturing the dance on repeatedly to focus on their mental images, or
Friday night rather than picturing the actions of "television in the mind," as a way to monitor
the text) it is as if the channel has been switched comprehension. In addition to prompting, teach
from the "story" channel to the "dance" channel. ers may need to teach and model the fix-up strate
We teach students they need to do something gies to use when the picture is missing or fuzzy.
when this "channel switching" happens, such as We have found that this modeling and prompt
Afterstrippingoff as many of the lowerbranchesas he could, (Ackerman, 1994), an adolescent novel dealing
he laidthe rootend of thealderon topof thedownedmaple's with the Holocaust. As we examined the draw
trunk.He did the same thingwith the other twoalders. Next ings (see Figures 2, 3, and 4) it became clear that
he gatheredpine and cedarboughs.... He laidthemon topof there was great variability in what the students
thealders, forminga crude roof.He placed thealderbranch were portraying. Drawings in Figures 2 and 3
es thathe had removedacross the farend of theshelter,prop represented scenes directly from the novel be
ping themup to forma backwall. The shelterwas shaped like ing read, whereas the drawing in Figure 4 may
halfa tent,with an openingat one end. (pp.46-48) have had something to do with the topic of the
Holocaust but had no direct connection to the
After the teacher drew a step-by-step sketch of events included in the day's reading. Drawings
what was happening, the students voiced under that are related to the topic but not the text
standing. See Figure 1 for the drawing. should prompt the teacher to question students to
struggling readers than skilled readers. For ex engage students more deeply with the text if the
students are set up for it. Our experience when
ample, Rusted and Coltheart (1979) confirmed
that poor readers frequently move from text to reading Such Nice Kids (Bunting, 1990) pro
vides an example of this. We knew that the main
pictures to text as they read, using the pictures as
a tool for understanding. In contrast, good read characters depicted on the cover of this text
ers pay little attention to the illustrations during looked much younger than they were described
their reading.Goldstein andUnderwood (1981) in the text. In our prereading discussion of the
confirmed that less competent readers are influ book with a small group of eighth-grade boys,
enced to a greater degree by text illustrations. we asked them to make predictions about the
For readers who struggle, pictures operate be ages of the characters. We then asked the boys
the decoration function to look for information as they read that either
yond (Levin, Anglin, &
as a tool to create or con supported or refuted their predictions. Several
Carney, 1987), serving
firm understanding. An of this was times while reading the novel, discussion re
example
when a small group of students reading Slam turned to the cover illustration. The students def
(Myers, 1996) repeatedly looked back at the initely felt the boys on the cover looked younger
cover to verify points in the novel. The cover de than 17, as described in the text. However, they
still studied the cover and tried to identify the
picts a young man holding a basketball in one
arm, staring through a chain-link fence. Students characters by name. And, regardless of the ob
turned to the cover when Slam, the main char vious misrepresentation of age, the readers used
other information on the cover to predict what
acter, was described as being six feet, four inch
es. One young man turned to the cover when we was going to happen. One of our final discus
sions included an overall critique of the cover
read, "I remember walking away to the other
side of the park and then turning back and look
ing through the fence to where he was" (pp.
30-31). The next day the student pointed out the Figure3
cover illustration and retold the incident in the Student drawing, true to text,while listening toNight Crossing
prereading discussion.
Sometimes a picture is not worth a thousand
words. When the text and illustrations do not
match, the illustrations can actually interfere with
comprehension and reduce learning (Willows,
1978). We found this to be true when a group of
middle school reluctant readers read "A Few
Dirty Words" (Scott, 1999), a play dealing with
harassment in school. The students nearly re
belled due to the one illustration that accompa
nied the play. The illustration of two young male
basketball players and a female manager ap
peared four pages into the play. The students had
already created an image of the characters based
on the text. The images described by the students
did not match the illustration. According to the
students, the two basketball players pictured were
6. Afterstudents readthe firstassigned text, it is discussed you can actly see whats going on and you
with thespecific intentofmaking thecriticalelements more can under-stand it better.
salient and pointing out thatstudents can use the images you can get a better picture of things. I'n
fromthemovie to add to theirunderstanding. the movie it seems likeWaller is nicer then
7. Students watch the second clip of themovie. This clip in the book. Waller helps them pick cot
should cover thematerial thatstudents have just readbut ton.... I'n the book Waller treats them with
not go beyond that.This allows readersto see the visual no respect what so ever.
representationofwhat theyhave read, to confirm the un
movies are really discriptive. It show you
derstandingtheygained fromreading,and to preparethem
forthe nextsection of reading. exactly whats happening. It's also more re
laxing. I also like it better cause the end
8. Students discuss any new understandingsandmake pre
ing isn't letting you hang there as much as
dictionsabout thenextsection of textto be read.
the book does.
9. The cycle ofwatch, discuss, read,discuss, watch, discuss,
readdiscuss continues until the novel iscomplete or stu the movie was more interesting. It had a lot
dents have gained enough backgroundthattheycan read more detels, and you could acealy see what
the restof the novel independently. was going on and you just couldn't amagin it.
1. Don't assume your students can use visual imagery to support reading comprehension. Check out their
ability to create images with discussions of what they "see" or with student-generated drawings.
2. Students who have imagery skills may need to be prompted to use imagery to support comprehension.
Those who don't have the skill will need to be taught.
3. Look for opportunities tomodel imagery strategies to your students. Discussing what you see on the tele
vision screen inyour mind will help students better understand this process.
4. Support for comprehension with visuals tools does not need to be elaborate. A teacher-drawn sketch or
picture can provide the necessary clarification for students who are confused or lack the knowledge
necessary for understanding.
5. Lack of ability to create images or ineffective images may be due to lack of background knowledge or
vocabulary rather than reading skill. If this is the case, background knowledge will need to be built.
Providing the knowledge with picture books, movies, or other visual media also gives students a visual
"memory peg" with which to connect new information from the text.
6. Student drawings can be used formultiple purposes, but must be used strategically. Provide students with
a purpose for drawing. Help them see that their drawings are a representation of their understanding,
that drawings can help them remember important information, and that earlier drawings can be used to
make predictions about what might happen next.
7. Be mindful that lower ability readers tend to rely on text illustrations more than good readers. When the il
lustrations are accurate representations of the text, encourage students to use them to support compre
hension. When the illustrations are not a good match, use this mismatch to provoke discussions that lead
to deeper understanding of the text and build evaluation skills. Set students up for the mismatch before
hand so they won't be disappointed and possibly disengage from the text.
8. Use movies inways that address students' learning needs. Carefully select movies based on the learn
ing goals?to build general background knowledge about a topic addressed in text; to provide visual im
ages of setting, characters, and relationships in the story; to teach comprehension skills such as
summarizing, predicting, and confirming; or to promote evaluation skills by comparing and contrasting the
movie with the text. Be explicit with students about the learning objective forwatching the movie.
It is interesting that some students who pre Our students have provided evidence that the
ferred the book also said they liked it better be use of movies as an instructional tool has sup
cause it provided more details. Many of these ported their learning. However, we have found
students liked the fact that they could create their that students benefit most when we are strategic
own in their minds, about the use of movies and are clear with stu
images of the characters
dents about why we are using movies and what
rather than using the ones provided by the
they should attend to. This is consistent with the
movie. Basically, they liked their images better.
of comments
work of Solomon (1984) who found that setting a
Examples by students favoring the
for a increases the
purpose viewing program
book version of the story included, "I liked the
learning related to that purpose. Teachers need
book better than the movie because..." to decide whether movies would be useful in ad
the book has more detail you get to know dressing the learning goals and the needs of the
the chariders a little better. students and then be explicit with students about
the desired outcomes.
it explind all the parts. I could see what I
ing the text is increased. If students are not able to Kozma, R.B. (1991). Learning with media. Review of
Educational Research, 61,179-211.
develop images because they are using all their
Levin, J.R. (1981). On functions of pictures in prose. In FJ.
mental energy to decode the words or their per Pirozzolo & M.C Wittrock (Eds.),Neuropsychological and
sonal experiences have limited their vocabulary cognitive processes in reading (pp. 203-228). New York:
sketches, illustrations, picture books, and movies Paivio, A. (1983). The empirical case for dual coding theory.In
J.C Yuille (Ed.), Imagery, memory, and cognition: Essays in
provides students with information on which to
honor of Allan Paivio (pp. 307-332). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
build their internal images. By supporting students Paivio, A. (1986). Mental A dual-coding
representations: ap
with these tools, the teacher provides students with proach. New York: Oxford University Press.
essential elements necessary for responding to the Peeck, J. (1987). The role of illustrations in processing and re
membering illustrated text. In D.M. Willows & H.A.
text. Don't be surprised that when you use these
Houghton (Eds.),Thepsychology of illustration:Vol. 1 (pp.
tools, comments like, "I don't know what hap 145-155). New York: Springer-Verlag.
Iwas too busy reading the words" change Pressley, G.M. (1976). Mental imagery helps eight-year-olds re
pened,
member what they read. Journal of Educational
to "Oh!Now I get it!" Psychology,
68, 355-359.
Pressley, M., & McCormick, C. (1995). Advanced educational
psychology. New York: HarperCollins.
teaches atPound
Middle
School S Rusted, J.,& Coltheart,V. (1979). The effect of pictures on the
Hibbing reading (4740 retention of novel words and prose passages. Journal of
NE68516,USA).Rankin-Erickson
45thStreet,Lincoln, Experimental Child Psychology, 28, 516-524.
in
teaches theDepartmentofSpecialEducationand Sadoski, M. (1983). An exploratory study of the relationships be
tween reported imagery and the comprehension and recall of a
Communication at theUniversity
Disorders of
story. Reading Research Quarterly, 19,110-123.
Nebraska-Lincoln. Sadoski, M. (1985). The natural use of imagery in story compre
hension and recall: Replication and extension. Reading
Research Quarterly, 20, 658-667.
Sadoski, M., Paivio, A., & Goetz,
E.T. (1991). A critique of
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Earthrise
Claudia M. Reder
Proud of his poem in which he has neatly printed the word sunset
several times around the sun he had drawn,
setting
a first grader shares his poem with a classmate.
The picture takes up the whole page.
Rederisapoetandstoryteller
who teachesat LesleyUniversityinCambridge, USA.
Massachusetts,