Thinking Routines / Zoom In
Zoom In
The picture opens magnified on one small detail, so nobody can tell what it is. The class commits to a guess anyway — then it pulls back, twice, and they have to change their minds out loud.
Opens on the whiteboard to model with the class · no sign-up · printing is optional
The sheet it prints — optional
What is the Zoom In thinking routine?
Zoom In is a thinking routine in which a picture is shown magnified on a single detail, then pulled back in stages until the whole image is visible. At each stage the class says what they think it shows and what makes them say that, revising the answer as more appears.
How do you run Zoom In with a class?
Show the magnified detail and take three guesses before anyone can be right. Write those guesses on the board where the class can see them. Pull back to the middle view, take three more, then reveal the full picture and compare. The whole thing runs in five to ten minutes.
The written guesses are what make it work. A class that cannot see its earlier answer will not notice itself changing its mind — and noticing that is the learning, not the picture.
Which pictures work best for Zoom In?
A picture with one surprising thing in it, near the middle. Landscapes fail, because any part of a landscape tells you it is a landscape. The strongest choices are busy scenes, close-up textures, unusual objects and paintings with a story in them — anything where the meaning only arrives late.
- Science — a close-up of an insect, a crystal, the surface of the moon.
- History — a photograph of a street, a piece of Anglo-Saxon jewellery, a page of a diary.
- Art — any painting with more than one thing happening in it.
- Geography — a market, a river delta from above, a settlement built somewhere strange.
The version that works is the one where I write the wrong guesses up and leave them there. The first time I ran it I rubbed each guess out as it was replaced, and the lesson fell flat — the children treated it as a quiz they kept failing. Left up, the board fills with a visible trail of thinking, and by the reveal they are arguing about when they should have changed their minds rather than who got it right. The other thing I would tell my past self: stop asking “what is it?” and ask “what makes you say that?” instead. The first question gets you a shouted noun. The second gets you a sentence with evidence in it, which is the whole reason you are running the routine.
What age group is Zoom In for?
Zoom In works from about Year 2 upwards, which is grade 1 in the US. Younger children need an obvious picture and a lot of pace; older ones can cope with an ambiguous image and a longer argument about the evidence. The routine itself does not change — only the picture and how long you dwell.
| Year group | US grade | What to change | How long |
|---|---|---|---|
| Years 2–3 | Grades 1–2 | One obvious object. Accept single words, then push for one reason. | 4–5 min |
| Years 4–5 | Grades 3–4 | A busy scene. Insist every guess comes with the detail behind it. | 8–10 min |
| Year 6 and up | Grade 5+ | An ambiguous or unsettling image. Ask who changed their mind and why. | 10–15 min |
What usually goes wrong?
Two things. The class races to name the object and stops thinking once someone is right, which you fix by never confirming a guess until the final step. And the loudest child anchors the room, which you fix by taking three guesses in writing before any discussion, so quieter children commit before they hear the confident answer.
Zoom In compared with See, Think, Wonder
Both routines slow a class down before it interprets, but they do it differently. Zoom In withholds the picture so the class has to guess and then revise. See, Think, Wonder shows everything at once and separates observation from interpretation. Zoom In is the better opener; See, Think, Wonder is the better second lesson.
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Where this routine comes from: the Zoom In thinking routine was developed by Project Zero, a research center at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Sage Teachers is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Harvard University or Project Zero. The prompts and the wording on this page are our own.