Spark

Depends on the activity

The visual teacher understands that imagery communicates in an emotional style that can bypass logical thought. He/she can encourage a bridge between “seeing” and “doing” through the use of appropriate projects, activities, and technologies (Gangwer, 2009, p. 6). While there are numerous visual tools and strategies that you can use to help students participate and master learning, consider the following guidelines:

1. Allow your students to select a medium of their choice to demonstrate their understanding. This choice could vary from photographs and posters to videos and objects.

2. Design activities that encourage visual thinking such as storyboarding, word pictures, visual problem solving, map reading, clay modeling, visualizing information through graphs, visual documentation, etc.

3. Provide the space and resources that the students would need to carry out the activities.

Pia teaches environmental studies to seventh grade students. She’s currently exploring pollution with her students. She wants students to especially think about pollution from the plant or animal’s point of view. What might a fish see in the water? What might bother a bird?

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She has her students select a plant or animal on which to focus their interest. Once they have made a selection, she asks them to research and write stories about the selected plant or animal. Alternatively, she allows students to illustrate stories with images or drawings to show the plant or animals’ point of view.