From: http://www.upsidelearning.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/what-motivates-people-to-learn.jpg
This semester, we will be considering how to design a variety graphics for instructional purposes (representative, organizational, interpretive, transformative). Since instructional images are designed to improve performance, it makes sense that you would need to consider:
- the audience
- instructional goals and objectives
- instructional strategies
- instructional methods, and
- instructional media
Malcolm Grear's design firm has been creating images for graphic design, identity, and web design for many years. In this short video, he discusses the importance of research and audience when working on a design project for a client. Please listen to what he has to say about the design process: http://vimeo.com/22305236
Do you think there is any point to decorative images, or should we ban them from clipart? How might you use instructional images to help your learners better understand a particular body of knowledge?
When I am reading in a text book and I have a representative or organizational visual my own personal ability to comprehend increases dramatically. Many times as I read articles I may not fully understand what a word means or the context the author is using it in, but when I can see a diagram further explaining the text I am provided with additional cues and meaning. Abstract concepts are difficult for visual learners such as myself; images aid in providing an better understanding for certain material.
ReplyDeleteAs part of my Foundations of Ed Tech class I took last semester we had to complete a final project on a type of technology of our choosing. This was to consist of a 7-10 page paper. I completed the majority of this assignment with written text, but I also incorporated a digital story to help provide further understanding.
I believe that decorative images are appealing to viewers and that it keeps participants engaged and motivated. I also believe that when a decorative image takes away from the content the author/illustrator is portraying then it is not an effective means of communication.
As a kindergarten teacher I am constantly using instructional images. One of my most important jobs is teaching students to read and I cannot expect my students to comprehend written messages when they do not have the ability/skills to do so. An example of this would be writing a message in Spanish and expecting people who speak English to understand (to most of my students-at the beginning of the year- writing is a foreign language). Not only do I use instructional images because my students do not have the ability to read, but because developmentally they cannot think abstractly. As I teach math I do not begin teaching addition by writing 3+2, but instead I would have 3 cookies drawn on one side and 2 cookies on another side and we would discuss how many we have all together.
Shaun, I really like your example about writing a message in Spanish. I volunteer in a kindergarten room, and images are being used all the time. I can't imagine what teaching would be without them!
DeleteThis video reminded me of an activity I did in one of my design classes I took during my undergraduate career. The activity required us to guess what company was being represented by only a piece of that company's symbol. For example, a tiny piece of NBC's rainbow logo was shown and we had to guess what it was. The activity ended up being pretty easy, even though we were not even allowed to see the entire logo, because we see a lot of those logos on a daily basis. Those logos, such as AT&T's, NBC's, etc. have taken a meaning beyond being just an image. It was a really cool activity and the entire class did a lot better than we all thought we would. Oh, and did I mention all of the partial images were in black and white- making it that much harder!
ReplyDeleteAfter reading Shaun's post, I really do agree with a lot of what he had to say. As we discussed in our first class, it is safe to say that many learners are visual learners, which means images really help in understanding material. I myself find it a lot easier to follow a set of steps in a procedure when there are instructional pictures to go along with them. Often times the images themselves can stand alone in showing the learner the steps they need to follow, but putting both words and images together brings out the best of both worlds.
Replying to the clip art question, that is somewhat hard to say. Although I do agree with an idea that Dr. Wilcox introduced in class in that making your own images that have strong meaning to the words and materials being presented, sometimes you do not have that time to create your own and have to revert to those that are "pre-made", such as clipart. I will say that you can find much better images online, but again, what if you do not have Internet for whatever reason and have to rely on images given in the software? I do think that clipart images are made for decorative purposes, but sometimes that what people need/want to use them for. For example, a birthday card. In that case, I would say that clipart should not be deleted completely, and that rather people should be instructed to use images that actually create more meaning to the material rather than to just make it look pretty.
Images have been used in most of my educational experience, most often in the form of clipart inserted into lecture visual aids. In my opinion, the majority of these images did not necessarily improve the performance or understanding of the students nor the presenter. That being said, the greatest example I have of my experience with images in my educational career comes from the PowerPoint design class I took in my undergraduate Communication Studies track. Microsoft PowerPoint is a largely misused presentation tool, so the class on meaningful use of images in PowerPoint and other presentation aids so that they did not distract the audience or hinder their concentration and understanding. This was often done through images representing and supporting the content spoken. As we referenced in class Wednesday, "a picture is worth a thousand words". To ensure that presentation aids improved performance and increased understanding, purposeful images were used in the place of excessive bullet points to represent ideas and provide a sort-of anchor point for the mind to recall the information. I think a better understanding of the line between useful and harmful images could make a great impact in education.
ReplyDeleteTo my last point mentioned above, there is a time and a place for decorative images. I do not believe they should be banned entirely, just used appropriately. As far as clipart, when I hear 'clipart' I get a nails-on-the-chalkboard feeling that is associated with largely-cheesy 90's graphics. Britney mentions that without access to the internet, clipart may be the only tool available. So if clipart must be used I would still keep them extremely minimal and simple for fear that the images would only inhibit understanding. Perhaps my definition of clipart is too limited and it actually encompasses more than the preloaded images included in Microsoft, in which case, let me know.
To Britney's logo exercise, there are now several versions of this same exercise in app formats for smartphones, iPads, computers, etc. Dubbed, 'Logo Quiz', it is interesting to see how well brands can be identified from partial logos. Our absorption of images on a subconscious level is astounding.
Caitlin- that is cool! We did this exercise I think 3 or so years ago but had no idea they had apps for it now. Like I previously said, I enjoyed this activity because it was so cool to see how many logos we could identify just by a little piece of them; just goes to show how powerful images are.
DeleteIn thinking about your own educational experience, how often have you seen images used?
ReplyDeleteImages are often used. Everywhere you look there are images. Every text book I have used has some sort of image or design on the front cover. Mots books have images or illustrations to accompany the text to help the reader better understand. In the reading for this week Ch. 11 discussed infogrpahics. Before this class I had never heard of this term. Once I began to read I realized that these are commonly used and I have seen many before.
How were the images used to improve performance or aid understanding in some way?
In textbooks sometimes graphics are used to show what the text is trying to explain. It is often helpful for the learners to see visually what the text is describing. Infographics are also sometimes used in textbooks. These are helpful because the graphics can sometimes replace large blocks of text that it would take to describe the same thing. The inforgraphics can also help to show the relationships between items helping the view better understand the information.
Do you think there is any point to decorative images, or should we ban them from clipart?
I believe that there is a place and time for everything. There may be times when decorative images are appropriate and necessary for a particular use. Banning any type of image from clip art would be doing a disservice to the users who may need those images. I think Clipart should be a robust image database so it can meet the needs of its customers. The more types and varieties of images the better. Then when looking for an image there is a better chance Clipart would have the image you are looking for.
How might you use instructional images to help your learners better understand a particular body of knowledge?
Instructional images such as infographics help to visually convey the information to make the information easier for the user to understand. The infographis graphically depicts the information in a simple way that is easy for the viewer to understand.
Other visuals such as a picture can show the reader visually what the text is describing. Including visuals and text helps the reader to remember the information by dual coding and displaying the information in multiple channels.
I think when I was growing up, most images consisted of “largely-cheesy 90’s graphics” (as Caitlin would call them) and could be found everywhere—within textbooks, handouts, powerpoints, and other published materials. These images were very generic, overly simplified, overused, and often even misused completely. It seems like throughout my earlier education especially, educators were more limited by a fewer number of images within the clipart libraries available to them. And it did not help that because there were so few images, most were very generic, so the same ones were used all over the place and carried no unified meaning or significance. More often than not, though, as we’ve discussed, these images ended up being decorative more than anything, and did not add to learners’ understanding of content. In college, most professors still seemed to use corny graphics that were white space fillers rather than meaningful tools to accompany the material being learned.
ReplyDeleteI do remember many very boring organizational images throughout my earlier schooling, but I think that these types of images have changed dramatically in the past two decades. Organizational graphics in textbooks and handouts were often in black or white, or at best monochromatic. They were often very linear and concrete, with rigid geometric shapes or arrows outlining content. Now, these organizational images contain more color, which allows for better learner understanding, as components in these images can be color-coded or highlighted. Many great organizational images are less restricted and more organic/abstract, which can help a learner spatially. I do think there is a place for decorative images, but when they are used and integrated correctly, I no longer call them “decorative images.”
If we are considering the role of graphics in an educational setting, visual culture must also be examined, as it plays a major roll on individuals today, perhaps more than ever. Today we are inundated with a specific group of images that are strategically designed and strategically located throughout our world. Most of the time we take a billboard or Nike ad or even a fruit rollup box for granted, and we don’t typically categorize them as “images.” I think we must begin to consider these images of visual culture in a more critical way than perhaps we did before and analyze them for how they send subliminal messages to not only youth but adults too. These images communicate strong messages to broad audiences, as they often transcend words, which would be more limiting. It is important when teaching or training to be aware of visual culture and to be able to embrace it and use it to our advantage. I think it’s also important to draw on relevant visual culture and relate it to content whenever possible. In one of the articles for this class it was mentioned that our generation cannot actually decode images as fluently as was presumed, and that they are quite illiterate at reading pictures. Perhaps this claim is true for some graphics, but I think much of visual culture defies these claims. If you’d ask any of the art ed professors at JMU, they would argue that youth are, in fact, able to quickly and subconsciously read and be highly influenced by visual culture images and objects. Images, in general, are endlessly powerful in the context of education, and they hold great potential for persuasion and other forms of communication. They can captivate, draw attention, and motivate an audience of learners.
I guess I have never really thought about it before, but images were constantly being used throughout my educational experience. Images were used to symbolize a more complicated topic. For example, graphs were used to help make the data easier to understand. Images were also used to help make sense of the text. For example, when learning about the human body, there was a picture of a human with labels next to it so that I could see where each part was located. Just when looking around the classroom, I noticed pictures on the walls. Sometimes these pictures were educational, and other times they were simply there to help create a more pleasant environment. Throughout my educational experience, and still today, graphic organizers have provided me with a visual to help guide and record my thoughts.
ReplyDeleteImages have improved my performance because they can help aide text, make something more visually appealing which results in more motivation, and it can simplify a concept. Also, images can sometimes provide a quicker way to gain information. Instead of reading my twelve page paper from last semester, I can instead look at my graphic organizer to quickly see the key points. Also, as mentioned in the video, identities have been given to certain images that allow for me to recognize something right away.
I believe that decorative images can be beneficial and they should not be banned from clipart; however, sometimes they can be distracting if they are overused or not used in the correct context. When creating a newsletter for a kindergarten classroom, I used clipart to help give a sense of meaning, as well as to create a “mood” for the letter. I wanted to letter to be fun and exciting for both the parents and students. Without the decorative images, I believe the letter would have been boring and not as interesting to read. The clipart helped provide motivation for the readers, because it hopefully looked exciting and made them want to read.
I think there are times when fancy line art can be used effectively. In my industry of hospitality, invitations are frequently decorated with decorative images that make sense for that. Imagine a formal wedding invitation without decorative images. While I have seen them, if we are satisfying a specific audience and a level of formality, decorative images are necessary.
ReplyDeleteConnecting visuals to learning is fascinating. Every sense in the human body allows memories to surface. A touch can bring back a memory of petting a childhood animal. A song can remind us of our first dance and a smell can remind us of Grandma's house. Visual memories can easily instruct, remind and allow us to recall.
In my classes, I take a lot of photographs and post them for my students to help them remember steps in creating a recipe. I also require students to create a photo album of what they want to see as they plan an event and what the ultimate result of that visual dream allows them to create later.