arp powerpoint erika rimes

Visual Literacy

An exploration into the teaching and student learning of visual

literacy in stage 3

Action Research ProjectErika Rimes

September 2007

Erika RimesSydney University306 205 904

Context of Research

Features of the school

Located in Sydney’s west

K-6, co-educational public school

Students in the school - 67% are from a non-English speaking background. Many countries are represented here, including countries in Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the Pacific Islands.

Features of the class

OC Stage 3 class consisting of 30 year 5 students

15 Boys and 15 girls

Cultural background of students in year 5 class ranged from Chinese, Indian and European


Rationale & Justification

Why visual literacy?

To develop students skills in becoming critical thinkers of their surroundings

To further my understandings of visual literacy and how to teach it

Visual literacy is an important of the KLAs

What is visual literacy?

Visual – refers to images we see (pictures, drawings, photographs, ads, moving images (TV/movies), artworks etc…)

Literacy encompasses a wider scope than simply being able to read and write. (Visual grammar – field, mode and tenor)


Research Question

How can I effectively develop students visual literacy skills in

stage 3 ?


Research

Kress & Van Leuween ‘Reading images, The Grammar of Visual Design’ Routledge Publishing, 1996, New York, NY

Unsworth, Len, ‘Teaching Multiliteracies across the curriculum’, Open University Press, McGraw-Hill Education,NY, 2001

Callow, Jon (ed.) ‘Image matters: Visual texts in the classroom’ (1999) PETA, Sydney

What’s happening?

(Is it symbolic/abstract/action…?)

*Action

*Message

How is the relationship developed

between the viewer, the image and

the image maker?

*Angles – Shot distance (long, medium,

close)

*Shot distances

*Colour

*Offers or demands

How is the image composed? *Reading paths – lines and vectors

*Layout

Summary of visual codes


Field

Mode

Tenor


Research aims

1: Develop student’s visual literacy skills through a variety of experiences

2: Develop structured and useful visual literacy tasks and assessments

3: Develop and reflect on my own teachings of visual literacy to further improve on my teaching practice


Methodology

Observations •Class discussion with students

•Group discussion among students

•One-on-one discussions with students

Work samples •Written responses from students

•Visual arts task

Reflections and

discussions

•Mentor teacher before and after lessons about

the lessons

•My own reflections on my teaching practiceErika RimesSydney University306 205 904

Teaching Strategies overview

Teaching and Learning Experience

Outcomes and Indicators

Assessment


Cycle One

Students capability when identifying and interpreting images

Reflect on my own teachings of visual literacy

Assess students learning at the end of the cycle

Aims


Findings – Reading images & understanding the meaning

Observations: Introduction

Introduction using specific examples where visual images use colour,

angles and layout, lines and vectors to model & introduce the meta

language

Discussions as a class general ideas about the different images the students see

(where, when, why,)

Picture book / book

“To help understand the

text”

“Show characters in the

book”

“Images help say

something that can’t be

written”

Newspaper/magazine

“Show the most

important news first”

“Grabs your attention so

you will buy it”

“Uses big pictures to

make you read it”

Advertisement

“To persuade”

“To sell something that is

good”

“they (advertisers) say

only good things about a

product to sell it”

Artwork

“To express something

they (artists) are

interested in”

“To tell you something

about a place or a place in

time “


Findings – Reading images & understanding the

meaningObservations: Introduction Class Activity: Student’s own visual images to analyse

Not an assessmentErika RimesSydney University306 205 904

Findings – Assessment

What was evident?

Students were able to;

•Access meaning from the photograph and the text and refer to both in discussion

•Use heading and photograph to access meanings

•Read, review and discuss image with technical language

•Justify if the visual image supports the writers view

Assessment: ‘Outrageous Reactions’Board of Studies, Classroom Assessment Resource Stage

3: Module 3 Seeing the meaning

Discussion Framework

•What is happening in this photograph?

•What message is being communicated?

•How has the message been constructed? Think about:-The Camera Angle-The use of colour-Objects in the picture, their size and positionWritten Response with discussion•How do you think the photographer wants you to respond to this picture?

•Are you influenced in some way?

•Describe the ways the pictures support the written text placed in relation to the image?

•Why do you think it has been done this way?

•Describe the ways the picture don’t support the written text.

•What effect does this have on you the reader?


Work samples – Assessment 1Example: B - High


Work samples – Assessment 1Example: C - Sound


Work samples – Assessment 1

Example: D - Basic


Cycle One - Overview

Assessment Outcomes and Indicators – English Syllabus

RS3.5 Reading and viewing texts

Reads independently an extensive range of texts

with increasing content demands and responds to

themes and issues

*Understands a more complex expository

text

*Interprets a factual text

*Reads a text demanding a degree of

technicality and abstraction

RS3.7 Context and text

Understands that texts are constructed by people

and identifies ways in which texts differ according

to their purpose, audience and subject matter

*explains techniques used by the writer and

illustrator to represent a point of view and position

the reader

*identifies how camera angle, viewer

position, colour, size and shading in a visual text

construct meaning

*justifies opinions about the motives and

feelings of characters in literary texts

Board of Studies, Classroom Assessment Resource Stage 3: Module 3 Seeing the meaning, ‘Outrageous Reactions’


Cycle One - Reflection

Strengths Weaknesses Where to next?

Technology

Student classify and identify

Resources

Questioning

Students response from own

experiences

Modelling meta-language

Students justifying their

interpretation

Continue modelling meta-

language

Incorporate focus lessons

Further assessments

Group tasks


Cycle Two

Achieve specific outcomes and indicators from the English Syllabus

Implement focused activities ‘The Rabbits’ by John Marsden and Illustrations by Shaun Tan

Observe students ability to apply knowledge from Cycle 1

Aims


Findings – Observation: Lessons and activities

(Applying knowledge)

What was evident?

Students were able to;• apply meta-language to new images as well as

reviewing well-known images (‘Outrageous reactions’)

• understand and respect everyone’s different opinion and thoughts about values such as ‘freedom’

• discuss and justifying own views in a debate

• debate about own ideas which was sparked by visual images

• learn from visual images about different representation of values

Responding to ads

Responding to ‘Values Pictures’ (PETA)


Findings – Assessment 2“The Rabbits”

What was evident?

Students were able to:

•Read and understand symbolic and literal meanings in a •picture book

•Access meaning from pictures and text and refer to in discussion(Use of colour, layout and composition, characterisation, how the viewer is meant to feel/see certain things)

•Explain ways the illustrator and writer position the reader and represent a point of view

Discussion Framework

•When you first saw this picture book what of story did you think it was going to be? What made you think this?

•Now that you have read it, is it has you expected? Why, why not?

•Is there anything you don’t understand in this text?•(Discuss further)

•What is the picture book about? (Symbolic or literal)

•Who do you think the picture book is written for?

•What is the purpose of the picture book?

•What caught your attention? Why?

•Why would someone choose to read this picture book?


Assessment 2“The Rabbits”

Class discussion with students Written Response

What’s happening?

(Is it symbolic/abstract/action…?)

*Action

*Message

How is the relationship developed

between the viewer, the image and

the image maker?

*Angles – Shot distance (long, medium,

close)

*Shot distances

*Colour

*Offers or demands

How is the image composed? *Reading paths – lines and vectors

*Layout

Summary of visual codes

Field

Mode

TenorErika RimesSydney University306 205 904

Work samples – Assessment 2“The Rabbits”


Cycle Two - Overview

Assessment Outcomes and Indicators – English Syllabus

RS3.6 Skills and strategies

Uses a comprehensive range of skills and strategies

appropriate to the type of text being read

*uses, adjusts and combines higher order

skills in decoding texts and accessing

visual

*Information e.g. scanning for information,

examining pictures and text, reviewing

parts of the text

RS3.7 Context and text

Understands that texts are constructed by people

and identifies ways in which texts differ according

to their purpose, audience and subject matter

*explains techniques used by the writer and

illustrator to represent a point of view and position

the reader

*identifies how camera angle, viewer

position, colour, size and shading in a visual text

construct meaning

*justifies opinions about the motives and

feelings of characters in literary texts

Assessment task from Stage 3 Assessment Resource applied to ‘The Rabbits’


Cycle Two - ReflectionStrengths Weaknesses Where to next?

Students engaged in

content

Students applied prior

knowledge in a range of

settings

Group tasks

Values pictures –

cultural learning activity

More lessons on “The

Rabbits”

Students to produce

their own visual images

Students reflect on their

new skills in visual

literacy

Continue with relevant

content


Cycle Three

Assess students ability in creating their own visual image

Discuss with students how they feel now about reading, discussing and understanding visual images

Reflect on activities of visual literacy

Aims


Work Samples – Assessment 3Producing images – Movie Poster

Identity of students has been protectedErika RimesSydney University306 205 904

Work Samples – Assessment 3 Producing images – Movie Poster

Identity of students has been protectedErika RimesSydney University306 205 904

Cycle Three – Overview & Reflections

Assessment task from Stage 3 COGS Unit – Traditions and Heritage

Assessment Outcomes and Indicators – Visual Arts

VAS3.1 Investigates subject matter in an attempt to represent likeliness of things in the world*Explores historical events as subject matter for a movie poster

VAS3.2 Makes artworks for different audiences, assembling materials in a variety of ways*Considers the specific requirements of an artwork (poster) to clearly convey message to an audience

VAS3.3 Acknowledges that audiences respond in different ways to artworks and that there are different opinions about the values of artworks*Understands that artworks can be made for different reasons.*Recognises that an audience may have different views about the meaning of an artwork


* Need to continue visual literacy lesson s to further develop self-regulated and guided learning

* Engagement by the students depended on the subject content and the task set

* Further research into other areas of KLA’s such as Drama and Interactive Technology (website)

* Visual literacy lessons should be incorporated into KLA’s not just as a focused lesson

* Further implementation of visual literacy lessons in a main-stream class

Implications for Future

Practice

Conclusions from ARP

*Continue to incorporate visual literacy inteaching as it enhances student learning

and ispart of the curriculum.

*Students developed meaning making skills using

technical language

*Increase in High ( 17% - 48%) & outstanding

( 0% - 14%) assessments results and decrease

in Basic (33% to 10%)

*Visual literacy skills of students needs to be

developed through constructing not justdiscussing

*Important to always give students a range of

experiences when learning and developing new

Skills


BibliographyBoard of Studies, Creative Arts K-6, NSW Board of Studies, 1998 Board of Studies, English K-6, NSW Board of Studies, 1998 Board of Studies, ‘Outrageous Reactions’ , Classroom Assessment Resource Stage 3:

Module 3 Seeing themeaning,


Kress & Van Leuween ‘Reading images, The Grammar of Visual Design’ Routledge

Publishing, 1996, New York, NY Rowan, L., Gauld, J., Cole-Adams, J., & Connolly, A., ‘Teaching Values’, Primary English

Teaching Association2007, Sydney, Australia Simpson, Alyson, PEN 142 ‘Visual literacy: A coded language for viewing in the classroom.‘

(2004) PETA,Sydney. Unsworth, Len, ‘Teaching Multiliteracies across the curriculum’, Open University Press,

McGraw-Hill Education,NY, 2001


Questions ?


arp powerpoint erika rimes

Documents

teachings of visual

visual texts

useful visual literacy

students skills

visual grammar field

students capabilitywhen

students group discussion

open university press