Imagine a free teaching activity that:

Is fun for students of all ages and used by teachers across disciplines

Can serve as a bell-ringer, a homework assignment or the focus of a lesson plan

Helps students get better at observing closely, making arguments and using evidence to support their claims.

Welcome to “What’s Going On in This Picture?” — our popular weekly feature now in its eighth year.

Here’s how it works: Each Monday we post an intriguing photograph that has been stripped of its caption and other identifying information. Then, students from around the world join a live-moderated discussion, telling us what they notice and what conclusions they can draw from those observations. The conversation continues all week, often attracting over a thousand comments, until we post a “reveal” on Thursday afternoons.

In the 45-minute webinar above, we discuss a variety of ways to use “What’s Going On in This Picture?” in subjects from science to social studies, English to the arts, and we participate together in our own live “WGOITP?” activity. We’re joined by Christa Forster and David Franke, two teachers who use the feature, as well as by Addie Gayoso, a moderator from our partner organization, Visual Thinking Strategies, that runs the live-moderated Monday discussions.

Webinar Resources

Resource List: In this PDF you can find links to all the resources we discuss in this webinar.

Original Webinar: You can watch the original, unedited webinar here and download a professional development certificate at the end. The webinar is free, but registration is required.

Webinar Special Guests

Adrienne (Addie) L. Gayoso, Senior Educator at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C.