INFORMATION LITERACY : VISUAL LITERACY: Life on the Screen: Visual Literacy in Education
David P. Dillard
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INFORMATION LITERACY :
VISUAL LITERACY:
Life on the Screen: Visual Literacy in Education
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Life on the Screen: Visual Literacy in Education
The visionary filmmaker argues that students must learn a new language of
image and sound in order to succeed.
By James Daly
Edutopia
http://www.edutopia.org/lucas-visual-literacy
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What do students need to be learning that they're not?
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They need to understand a new language of expression. The way we are
educating is based on nineteenth-century ideas and methods. Here we are,
entering the twenty-first century, and you look at our schools and ask,
'Why are we doing things in this ancient way?' Our system of education is
locked in a time capsule. You want to say to the people in charge, 'You're
not using today's tools! Wake up!'
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What would you change?
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We must teach communication comprehensively, in all its forms. Today we
work with the written or spoken word as the primary form of communication.
But we also need to understand the importance of graphics, music, and
cinema, which are just as powerful and in some ways more deeply
intertwined with young people's culture. We live and work in a visually
sophisticated world, so we must be sophisticated in using all the forms of
communication, not just the written word.
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When people talk to me about the digital divide, I think of it not being
so much about who has access to what technology as who knows how to create
and express themselves in this new language of the screen. If students
aren't taught the language of sound and images, shouldn't they be
considered as illiterate as if they left college without being able to
read or write?
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Unfortunately, most learning institutions find that idea very difficult to
swallow. They consider the various forms of nonwritten communication as
some type of therapy or art, something that is not relevant to the
everyday life of a student. This is wrong.
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You can measure verbal or math skills by determining whether a student is
right or wrong on a test -- in other words, whether they're learning or
not. With visual communication, some might argue it's trickier to measure
progress and competency.
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But there are rules for telling a story visually that are just as
important as grammatical rules or math terms, and you can test people on
them as well. There is grammar in film, there is grammar in graphics,
there is grammar in music, just like there are rules in math that can be
taught. For instance, what emotion does the color red convey? What about
blue? What does a straight line mean? How about a diagonal line?
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In music, if you want somebody to feel sad, what kind of a chord do you
use? A minor chord? A major chord? We know that a fast rhythm makes you
feel one way and a slow rhythm makes you feel another. If you want to get
somebody excited, you use one kind of rhythm; if you want people to feel
important, you use another. If you're going to put together a multimedia
project, you need to know that you can't have a fast rhythm track if
you're talking about death. It just doesn't work. You're not communicating
well.
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We also know that if you're trying to calm people down, you don't use the
color red. Or, if you're trying to get people excited, you do use the
color red. If you want people to be calm, you use a flat line; if you want
them to be excited, you use a jagged or a diagonal line.
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Knowing these things is as important as knowing what a verb and a subject
are, what a period and an exclamation point mean.
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How do we bring these lessons into the classroom?
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snip
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Additional Topics Covered in This Article:
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What's at stake if this understanding doesn't make its way into the
classroom?
Some might say you're being too idealistic, that the schools don't have
enough money for pencils. Shouldn't we focus on that first?
Where did your passion for education come from? What kind of student were
you growing up?
Do you think the education field will get your message?
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The complete article may be read at the URL above.
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Sincerely,
David Dillard
Temple University
(215) 204 - 4584
jw...@temple.edu
http://workface.com/e/daviddillard
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