Gallery Walk
Table of Contents
Bloom's Level
Use
Setting
Activity
Technology
Related Strategies
Description
A gallery walk is a teaching strategy where students walk around the room to explore a variety of written information, images, objects, or digital content displayed at different locations. Students observe and respond to what they see as if walking through an art gallery. Typically, small groups work collaboratively to create a poster or display in response to a prompt, question, or task. Each group posts their work for others to explore and discuss orally or through writing. There are various ways to implement a gallery walk depending on the learning objectives or goals of the activity. While teachers can post material for students to explore, the teacher’s role is primarily a facilitator.
When To Use It
As a learning strategy, use a gallery walk when you want students to:
- share individual or group work with others
- provide written or verbal feedback on their classmates’ work
- examine a variety of information on a topic
- demonstrate synthesis of knowledge and ideas
- get out of their seats to observe, discuss, analyze, and reflect upon various ideas and perspectives
As an instructional strategy, use a gallery walk when you want to:
- display various ideas and perspectives from which students can gain knowledge or react to
- display student work for discussion
- assess cooperative learning or group work
- provide an alternative for student presentations
How To Use It
Advance Prep
The way you implement a gallery walk depends on the goals and learning objectives of the activity, so the first thing you need to do is to determine how you want to use the gallery walk to support your learning objectives. You may want students to engage in a small group discussion at each location or conduct a “silent conversation” by posting comments and responses on sticky notes. You might decide to have a whole group discussion after students visit each display.
After you have identified your learning goals and how you would like to conduct the gallery walk, gather the appropriate materials. These might include poster paper, markers, sticky notes, or devices. If you are posting the content, prepare the information for students to examine.
Implementation
- Introduce students to the gallery walk. Explain and model the gallery walk activity. Provide specific instructions for how each group should work together to create their display and what they should do during the gallery walk.
- If this is a cooperative learning activity, assist students with assigning group roles (leader, reporter, recorder, etc.), but emphasize that everyone must participate.
- After students have posted their work for the gallery walk, instruct students to walk around to examine each display, following any guidelines for the activity, such as taking notes, engaging in discussion, and posting feedback, observations, or comments. Give guidance on how students should move about the room so that large groups of students are not clustered in one area. You might give 3-5 minutes for small groups to observe one display before moving on to the next. If appropriate, circulate to help facilitate discussion among students.
- Once all groups have revisited each display, give students time to reflect upon their classmates’ feedback or their conversation. You may provide a prompt to focus their reflection.
- Finally, have students share out. Depending on the nature of the activity, small group discussions or a whole group discussion might be appropriate. The discussion questions will be dependent on the purpose of the gallery walk. The final discussion might also be a good time to assess understanding.
Pros
- Allows students to get up from their seats as they explore information
- Provides an alternative to verbal discussion for those students who are reluctant to speak
- Promotes cooperative learning and peer feedback
- Provides an opportunity for students to engage with a variety of perspectives
Cons
- Requires adequate space for posting displays and movement
- Difficult to assess individual student understanding
- Students may get off task during group work, discussions, and moving about the room
Culturally Responsive Application
A gallery walk can support culturally responsive teaching by providing a student-centered outlet for students to express their learning and ideas. A gallery walk is a highly flexible strategy, allowing for multiple means of presenting and communicating. It encourages students to share their perspectives and ideas, both as producers of their displays and consumers of others’ work. Depending on the implementation of the activity, students may have a choice in how they share their ideas in a culturally relevant way. The cooperative learning aspect of the gallery walk, particularly the group work involved with creating the displays, also promotes inclusion as students share their unique perspectives.
Emerging English Language Support
It builds student’s confidence in using English language naturally and comfortably by promoting speaking among students in a more relaxed environment as they move from one gallery to another in the classroom
Students with Disabilities Support
By using kinesthetic and visual learning, students analyze and evaluate primary sources to gain content knowledge and make connections
Subjects
All
Why It Works
In the application of gallery walk, learners engage in group discussion which builds a powerful learning community and develops creativity. Gallery walk also promotes self-regulated learning since students are actively engaged through discussion and sharing of ideas which in turn increases learning autonomy (REF10). A study shows gallery walk could help mitigate imposter syndrome through planned study and focus on content which made the student feel confident and reassured (REF11) Gallery walk encourages critical thinking (REF12) Gallery walk foster problem solving skills and stimulates students’ participation in the classroom (REF13)