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Published byErik Tate Modified over 8 years ago
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Visual Literacy Methods & Tips for Teachers
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What is Visual Literacy? Visual literacy refers to the ability to create effective communications using visual images and also being able to analyze and attach meaning to the visual images that one might see. By developing some basic visual literacy skills you can create powerful visual tools for use in your instruction.
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Getting Started: Information Selection Look at your curriculum and decide what are the most important points of information you need to get across. Less information = better retention of information
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Getting Started: Organization Once you have selected the most important information, then you should begin deciding how to organize the information. Try to organize information in a way that will help learners “chunk” the info. Psychologist Stanley Miller theorized that we can only remember 7 different items at one time. Chunking helps the learner to remember more information and gives you more “bang for your buck”.
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Organization Cont. You will also need to decide what you want learners to see first as well as what information you want to stand out.
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Getting Started: Integration Gestalt Theory- People tend to perceive information as a whole. Be aware of Gestalt principles such as proximity and try to organize your visuals into meaningful wholes. Tip: Use the same colors, shapes or alignment for a particular concept.
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Elements of Good Design: CARP Once you have thought about what information you want to include and how you would like to organize it; you can use the following CARP principles in order to help you develop better designs & stronger visual literacy skills.
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CARP: Contrast Creating contrast is a great way to direct your students’ attention to important points you are trying to make in your presentation.
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CARP: Ways to Create Contrast Make your headings larger & darker than the rest of the information. Break up different sections of information by allowing some white space between points or paragraphs. Use the different fonts and character effects available to you. Consider bulleting or numbering when appropriate.
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CARP: Alignment The way you choose to align information can help your students follow the information down the page & can also be used to help students chunk information. Text can be aligned around shapes, left or right margins, or it can be centered. Text is easiest to understand if it is aligned to the left.
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CARP: Repetition Repetition helps to unify and organize a presentation. You can create repetition by using the same pictures, fonts and font colors.
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CARP: Proximity Proximity refers to the distance between elements in a presentation. Elements that are close together are viewed as being related and vice versa.
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Tools for Effective Visuals Type, shape, colors, depth and space can all be used as tools to help you develop better instructional visuals.
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Tools for Effective Visuals: Type Type is a very easy but effective way to create contrast, identify chunks of information, and it can also be used to express emotion or enhance the materials being presented. Word has numerous fonts styles and you can also obtain specialty fonts from the web. http://www.fontspace.com has numerous free fonts that teachers can use. http://www.fontspace.com
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Tools for Effective Visuals: Shapes Shapes can be used to: Show unity Show a process Focus attention Show systems Contain information Help students make comparisons ex. Venn diagrams. Separate and define information Convey emotions Provide direction Imply motion
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Tools for Effective Visuals: Shapes In Word if you go to Insert-Pictures- AutoShapes you will find lots of shapes that you can put into your displays. There is also software such as Inspiration which you can use to create nice looking visuals.
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Tools for Effective Visuals: Color Color can be used to: Label information (maps) Identify quantities (charts & illustrations) Represent reality Create visual appeal In order to change the color of your font in Word you click on Font-Color located in your toolbar.
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Tools for Effective Visuals: Depth Adding depth to your presentations can help information stand out. You can create depth by using scale in order to make words stand out; or to show the actual size of an object by comparing it to another object. You can also create depth by using the shadowing tool or by using actual pictures of objects in your presentations.
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Tools for Effective Visuals: Space Space (white space) is a great tool to use when you are trying to separate information, draw attention to information (trapped space) or clarify text. Space can help balance information on a screen. Space can also be used to show time progression.
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In Closing… Most teachers have an instinctual knowledge of many of the principles. Hopefully you will be able to bring some new awareness of the principles mentioned in this presentation to the visuals in your classroom. You can do it!
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References All information in this presentation is from: Lohr, L. L. (2008). Creating graphics for learning and performance. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.
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