Good Readers make personal connections with what they are reading.  They develop a deeper understanding of the characters and their actions because they have made a connection to their own lives that enhances the mental images they are creating.  There are three kinds of connections: text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to world. A text-to-self connection occurs when students are reminded of something that has happened in their own life.  A text-to-text connection reminds them of something they have read in another book or text, and a text-to-world connection happens when they connect with something occurring in the world.  Making connections causes students to build schema, or background knowledge, around which other learning can be organized. 

Double Entry Journal

Text to Self Graphic Organizer

Two Column Notes in Math

Websites on Making Connections:

Math Literacy: Making Connections

http://www.cbcsd.org/schools/W-W/mathdep/mathlit/mc.html

Making Text to Self Connections Lesson Plan  (Grades 1-3)
http://www.sjc.edu/rchatel/interactivelessons/literatureconnections/Lesson%20Plan%20EDUC.htm

Making Text to Self Connections Think Aloud Lesson

http://www.studyzone.org/testprep/ela4/b/text-selfl.cfm

Text to Self Connections Lesson Plan Using The Relatives Came by Cynthia Rylant

http://alex.state.al.us/lesson_view.php?id=5545

Picture Books for Making Text to Self Connections

http://www.buffalolib.org/programs/readinglists2008/Amherst_Central.pdf

Making Connections - Text to Self
http://www.linbarconsulting.com/Instructional%20tools/Making_Connection_TTS.pdf

Guided Comprehension: Making Connections Using a Double Entry Journal Lesson Plan

http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=228

Making Connections

http://forpd.ucf.edu/strategies/stratText.html

Posters for Making Connections

http://www.teachingheart.net/comprehe.html

Reading Strategy: Making Connections

http://www.everett.k12.wa.us/CMS/cmsSites/cmsUserFiles/reading/files/Rdg%20Str-Connections.doc