Pedagogy of Teaching With Images

Hi all,
Images are a great tool to use in the classroom. The students can view images and use them to relate to a topic and be provided with visual stimulus to enhance their memory recognition. Learning managers need to assure that images are not just used to engage the learners, but that they have an educational purpose to enhance the learning process (Stokes, 2002).

The students of today need to become active learners rather than passive participants. The students must have an awareness to interpret visual text and have the ability to deconstruct and construct visual text. Students of today bring with them a rich understanding and prior knowledge through experience on visual literacy (Rettke, 2008). A study was completed in Victoria, on a range of year levels involving visual literacy. The teachers were given a variety of specific outcomes that they needed to achieve to teach the learners specific subjects using visual literacy as a tool for the learning (Rettke, 2008). An example was that one teacher was scaffolding the learning around the earth. She used visual diagrams and graphs to teach the students about the earth’s layers. She also used other mapping forms and diagrams. The student’s assessment reflected that the learners had high engagement in the topic and also were more capable to store the information because there were visual tools used to inform the learning.

Learning managers need to be aware of the importance of using information texts in the delivery of lessons and use them to scaffold the learning journey. This will ensure that the learners of today are visually literate and able to decode and encode a variety of information texts. Below are links to possible ways that learning managers could use visual literacy as a tool to instruct the learners across Key Learning Areas.

When using images in the classroom, learning managers need to be aware of how to resize images to upload them onto the web to ensure that they are not too big. Using a resizing tool such as MobaPhoto, allows you to upload images to embed in the learning experiences. It is easy to do and also needed to assure that the images that are uploaded and also downloaded are accessible.

An example of applying images in the classroom could include the use of the above optical illusion. The students could be shown this image and from there use the graphic organiser in Marzanos (1997) Dimensions of learning complex reasoning process of analysing perspectives. The students could look at both sides represented in the image and the image would be used to support and also to scaffold the content. Just an idea, let me know what you think.

Until next time,
Amy

References

Marzano, R. (1997). Dimensions of learning. Aurora, Colorado: McREL.

Rettke, N.; Wong, M.; Liapis, G.; Richardson, S.; et. Al. (2008). Brown case studies: Visual literacy in the classroom. Viewed on 17/07/2010 from: http://knowledge.education.vic.gov.au/sites/knowledgebank/knowledgebank/Lists/Case%20Studies/DispForm.aspx?ID325

Stokes, S. (2002). Visual Literacy in Teaching an Learning: A literature perspective. Retrieved on 17/07/2010 from: http://ejite.isu.edu/Volume1No1/pdfs/stokes.pdf