Images as educational tools - analysis

Ctrl Click on the DocStoc download button above to activate this document, or download via Google Docs.

This selection of ICTs is Group 2 Technologies - Multimedia: images, audio and video.  We are constantly bombarded by images in this modern world, so much so that they are taken for granted, almost treated as wallpaper. From day one, children are exposed to images. Long before they can read and write, even before they can talk, they understand images and make associations. It is easy to forget this process of understanding and learning, because it is a natural, unconscious process of osmosis. So much so that I have had to think long and hard about the educational uses of images, to educate, rather than just entertain. I just assume “visual literacy” by the time children start school.

“The first level of visual literacy is simple knowledge: basic identification of the subject or elements in a photograph, work of art, or graphic. The skills necessary to identify details of images are included in many disciplines; for example, careful observation is essential to scientific inquiry.

These higher-level visual literacy skills require critical thinking, and they are essential to a student’s success in any content area in which information is conveyed through visual formats such as charts and maps. They are also beneficial to students attempting to make sense of the barrage of images they may face in texts and web resources.”(Thibault and Walbert).

See, think, wonder routine

• What do you see?
• What do you think about that?
• What does it make you wonder?

is a routine (from Visible Thinking , Project Zero, an educational research group at the Graduate School of Education at Harvard University) to encourage pupils to make observations and thoughtful interpretations, to stimulate higher-level thinking, curiosity and to set the stage for inquiry.

It’s easy to see the huge advantages digital images over non-digital images in art appreciation and creation:  access to unlimited resources via the web; free and simple software manipulation tools; the ability to publish, share and collaborate as well as comment and appreciate over the web. (It’s also easy to see the minefield of copyright issues!).  But what about the use of images in subjects other than the arts?

Pre-reading age children have always had picture books.  But how much better are interactive online pictures they can move and edit, colour and resize?  Here are some examples, moving through age-ranges, for various subjects.

Maths

Take geometric shapes and learn their names and differences. 
Introduction for numeracy skills – number of sides., etc – for later use in geometry. 
Turn the geometric shapes into cartoon characters (an idea of Tom Hart’s)

Logic

Pictures can avoid long explanations in words which young children may not understand.
They can also communicate incomplete information so pupils can use their imagination, creativity and logic.

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2009/03/review-iphone-2/

Remember the old game where you drew a head on a piece of paper, then folded it over and passed it to the next person to add the body, then the legs and so on? 

What about doing this using ICTs?  Cutting images into pieces and having pupils match the various bodies?  Then get them to explain why they think they match:-

• “He's wearing a pirate hat so I think he'd be wearing boots with buckles”.
• “She's wearing a diamond tiara, so I think those ballet shoes are hers”.

How times change.  I looked online for an appropriate image to illustrate this mix and match idea, only to find, for $1, you can download an iPhone App in a similar vein!

English

What about using cartoons to explain the various tenses in English language? Click to view full-size image.

http://www.eslflow.com/picturelessonsandteachingideas.html

Science

Again, the use of cartoons and comics, to engage children in science, stimulating discussion and enquiry, leading to such projects as:-

http://www.jayhosler.com/Chapter3.html

• How honey is made.
• Camouflage used by some insects
• How a bee sting works, why its use can be deadly and its use for colony defence.
• Differences between solitary and social insects.
• Predatory crab spiders and how they subdue their prey.

To save time, and show my participation in the various course activities, I created the embedded PowerPoint click and drag document "Facial Emotions".  I used a webcam to take still photos (avoiding copyright issues!), resized them, then inserted them into a PowerPoint document.  I then saved the document online in order to be able to post it in my blog and share it.  I did use Google Docs, the course-suggested application, but did not find it as user-friendly as www.DocStoc.com, which embedded better and has a quick download button on the actual image once embedded.  GoogleDocs gave repeated link error messages :o(. 

Once you’ve downloaded the document (Ctrl Click to download it into a new tab), you can click and drag the images of different facial emotions, the idea being to match the word description with the emotion.  Pretend you're a kid - have fun!