Graphic organizers are a tool that teachers use to teach concepts all the time. However, they’re also really great to help YOU organize your thoughts or make sense of textbook chapters. For all of you non-educators out there, here are some great places to find them!
(Related: How to Summarize What You’ve Read)
Where I Found It: Daily Teaching Tools
How I’d Use It: Sure, it says it’s for “writing”, but you could also use this to help you outline a textbook chapter. When outlining a textbook chapter, I would probably have the chapter title in “topic”, the headers in the “subtopic” spaces, and minor headers/information in the dotted spaces.
(Related: Outline Chapters with a Graphic Organizer)
Where I Found It: Square Headed Teachers
How I’d Use It: This graphic organizer is perfect for helping you summarize a book or chapter in a literature course. It would also be helpful if you were writing. Having a sheet like this prepared before you walk into class will keep your memory and thoughts ready for discussion! Make sure to keep your notes organized so you know where to look!
*Bonus points if you color code it or draw pictures! 😉
Where I Found It: Teachers Pay Teachers
How I’d Use It: This is a perfect graphic organizer for helping you understand new vocabulary words! By simply filling out all five of these boxes, you’re hitting all six steps of Bloom’s Taxonomy, which will give you a better understanding of the topic!
P.S. Sorry for the blurry photo… the image I screen shotted was just small. This is a free download on TPT and I promise the form itself is not blurry 🙂
These are just a tiny sample of the graphic organizers out there! You can get cutesy elementary ones (my personal fave), or you can get very mature and detailed college and adult looking ones. And of course, you can always make your own!
Check out this lovely one a student in @mrslizscience‘s class came up with!
Still not sure where to look? Here are a couple of Google Searches to get you started:
Free Graphic Organizer College
Free Graphic Organizer High School
Free Graphic Organizer Kindergarten (sorry, I couldn’t resist. but look how cute!)
(Related: How to Effectively Use a Highlighter)
I hope this helps and makes your notes super pretty and organized! 🙂 Let me know in the comments if you tried any, or found any good ones that others can use!
Organized Charm 