La Shawn Austin Visual Literacy: IDT 560
Article Research
Visual Literacy La Shawn Austin Master Of Instructional Design & Technology
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La Shawn Austin Visual Literacy: IDT 560
Article Research
INTRODUCTION: Often times, as teachers or trainers we have to have versatility in how instruction is delivered. This is necessary to ensure that every student’s learning style is accommodated. Visual learners require some sort of visual aid to be included in instruction, to assist them in interpreting what is attempting to be conveyed. However, what seems to be up for debate is which types of visual aid (animated or static) are best suited to effectively enhance instruction.
LEARNING FACILITATION USING ANIMATED INSTRUCTION According to Lin H. (2001), “Researchers indicated that learners, when presented with animated instruction, were not able to “. . . effectively attend to the animation” or were “. . . distracted by the combination of visual and verbal information presented to them” (Rieber, 1990, p. 81).” Lin conducted an experiment which consisted of 583 students from Eastern University. This study was conducted to investigate which visual aid is more effective when delivering instruction. All 583 students were broken into six groups. Each group received the same instructional content, just in various formats. The formatted materials were distributed as follows: Group one: Animation alone. Group two: Animation + questions. Group three: Animation + questions + feedback. Group four: Static visuals alone. Group five: Static visuals alone. Group six: Static visuals + questions + feedback. The results provided that participants receiving the animated visual treatment (M = 12.66; SD = 5.80) scored significantly higher in the drawing test than did participants receiving the static visual treatment (M =10.22; SD = 5.89). In my opinion, this study was a very thorough one. As a current student myself, the illustrations alone, clarified and effectively demonstrated how I would respond receiving instruction with animated or static visual aids. If I had been a participant in this experiment, I would have to say that I would have most benefited from Group three’s visual aid and instructional materials. In this group the participants were provided with animated instruction which included questions and answers as well as feedback that elaborated on their answers.
CONCLUSION: The effects of how various instructional methods and their corresponding visual aids will definitely determine how effective your instructional material is conveyed. I believe taking into account how applying animated or static images can affect your overall instructional content will strengthen us as instructional design and technologist. Some ways of applying this research to the design of visual enhanced instruction are remembering there are students who have different learning styles and including animated images when very abstract and intricate content is being delivered.
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La Shawn Austin Visual Literacy: IDT 560
Article Research REFERENCES: Huifen L. Facilitating Learning from Animated Instruction: Effectiveness of Questions and Feedback as Attention-directing Strategies. Journal Of Educational Technology & Society [serial online]. April 2011;14(2):31-42. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Accessed February 13, 2013.
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