Visual Literacy

Image: Ray eye  Creative Commons license

To Read: Color matters! Read about color symbolism in different cultures and explore other parts of this website to learn more about the significance of color in our lives.

To Watch:  You are in the process of designing your teacher's website.  It should be important for you to make conscious decisions about how you present the content of the pages.  

What makes the page user-friendly? 

What are the most common design mistakes made when creating websites?  

To help you answer that, I created a short video about web design considerations: 

To Watch: Visual Diagramming, Concept Mapping, Mind Mapping - these phrases apply to visually brainstorming or organizing ideas. This video explains the benefits of it:

Concept Maps for teaching and learning - it may be a useful tool, especially for older students, to represent knowledge of a topic, make connections between ideas 

To use in the early elementary classroom (or with your kids): C.A.R.P. junior - Design Principles for kids - ideas for practicing them in an elementary classroom.

To challenge yourself: Look at these 25 of the most iconic photographs (according to CNN) - How many can you name just by looking at them?

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Additional optional resources:

ISTE Standards for Educators:
2.5c Educators explore and apply instructional design principles to create innovative digital learning environments that engage and support learning.
2.6d. Educators model and nurture creativity and creative expression to communicate ideas, knowledge or connections.

ISTE Standards for Students :
1.1b Students build networks and customize their learning environments in ways that support the learning process.
1.6c Students communicate complex ideas clearly and effectively by creating or using a variety of digital objects such as visualizations, models, or simulations.

• To browse: Free teaching resources from Visual Literacy today: https://visualliteracytoday.org/teaching-resources/
  
  
• To read: (elementary and middle grades): How to incorporate Visual Literacy in your classroom by using wordless texts to help students make observations in the illustrations while addressing six components of visual literacy: https://www.edutopia.org/article/how-incorporate-visual-literacy-your-instruction/ 

• To read (HS): Article about teaching Visual Literacy in high school English  https://www.secondaryenglishcoffeeshop.com/2022/10/the-3-rs-reading-riting-and-rithmetic.html
  
  
•  To interact: Play with colors professionally: Paletton.com- The color scheme designer.
  
  
• To read: How to Design For Color Blindness: https://www.getfeedback.com/resources/ux/how-to-design-for-color-blindness/ 
  
  
• To browse: Smithsonian Open Access:  where you can download, share, and reuse millions of the Smithsonian’s images. 

AI

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a relatively new field in K-12 education. It exploded at the beginning of 2023 with the release of a free version of Large Language Model, Generative AI, and ChatGPT.  As a digital-era educator, you probably want to have a basic understanding of how AI works,  how it will influence teaching and learning, and how to teach about it to your students.  Since we are in a lifelong learning profession, it is on us to keep up and understand the implications of the current trends. The changes are coming, and we are living in exciting times! So, let's dive in.

Machine learning from code.org

To Watch and Do (REQUIRED ASSIGNMENT Assignment #3 Submit the Certificate of Completion + Reflections as explained in an assignment description in eLearning): 
Complete this short eight-step unit from code.org designed to help you and your students learn about types of machine learning and training data, pattern analysis, classification models,  ethical issues such as bias, and even how AI can be used to address Global Goals! 

A human-centered approach to AI:

A human-centered approach to AI prioritizes the well-being and needs of humans in developing and implementing artificial intelligence systems.

It advocates that AI should be used to amplify human capabilities, creating collaborative interactions between humans and AI rather than replacing them.

UNESCO’s 2021 Recommendation on the Ethics of AI provides a framework for addressing controversies around generative AI in education and research. It advocates for a human-centered approach to AI 

• AI should be used to develop human capabilities for inclusive, just, and sustainable futures
• Human rights principles should guide the use of AI
• Human dignity and cultural diversity should be protected
• Proper regulation is needed for a human-centered approach to AI

To watch: (2 min.33s) Machine Learning and Human Bias - How it can perpetuate human bias, why it is important to know, how Google approaches this problem, and what you can do about it. 

The Artificial Intelligence (AI) for K-12 initiative (AI4K12): https://ai4k12.org/ :

Organize the topics surrounding Artificial Intelligence and organize them into 5 Big Ideas. Each Idea has a progression chart similar to DOK that can help you teach about AI in a different grade level.  

To do: Go to this link: https://ai4k12.org/gradeband-progression-charts/ and open a progression chart for each idea. Try to make sense of what kind of AI concepts and topics should be taught in each grade. Would you be able to teach them today? 

To browse: Resources from aiedu.org The AI Education Project. We used some resources from there while working on Digital Citizenship activities. 

To watch: Ted Talk How AI could save (not destroy) education (15 min)

Sal Khan (founder of Khan Academy) thinks AI could spark the greatest positive transformation education has ever seen.  See what opportunities he envisions for students and educators working with Khanmigo AI. Do you like his vision? What are the positives? Are there any downsides?  Do you agree with his statement that AI can be used to enhance HI?

To read and think: about Reconsidering Student Learning Outcomes in the Age of Generative AI - do you agree? What other skills, if any, will be important, and which should be revisited for their usefulness? 

Please create a free account on magicschool.ai—we suggest using a private account. We will evaluate it in labs. 

To read:  Inside the AI Factory. Behind even the most impressive AI system are people. Vast numbers of low-paid people label data to train it and clarify data when it gets confused. As the technology becomes ubiquitous, a large tasker underclass is emerging:

Other Resources (not required, but useful) 

To bookmark and use: Approaches & Guides to Prompt Engineering in LLM like ChatGPT

• ChatGPT cheatsheet list of prompts organized by topics from QuickRef.me
• Study smarter, not harder 13 techniques to use ChatGPT Prompts For Studying- YouTube
• Prompt Engineering in ChatGPT: A Comprehensive Master Course

To listen: Pondering AI podcast How is using artificial intelligence (AI) shaping our human experience? Kimberly Nevala talks with a diverse group of innovators, advocates, and data scientists.

To read, think, and interact: Is the modern development of "god-like technology" a new fire?  A philosophical question for the insomnia minds: Read and consider posting your response 

To read: 3 Ways Educators Can Use Artificial Intelligence. 

To browse: Secondary Idea for English 12: An Exploration of British Classic and Contemporary Science Fiction Literature Focusing on Artificial Intelligence: 

To read: Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Computer Vision.

To browse and bookmark: Applied Digital Skills with Google.

UNI resources for AI in Teaching & Learning: https://ai.uni.edu/

Train a computer to recognize your own images, sounds, & poses with a Google Teachable Machine

ISTE standards for Educators' connection:

• Standard 2.2 Leader: Educators seek out opportunities for leadership to support student empowerment and success and to improve teaching and learning.
• 2.2.c Model Digital Tool Use: Model for colleagues the identification, exploration, evaluation, curation, and adoption of new digital resources and tools for learning.
• Standard 2.3 Citizen: Educators inspire students to positively contribute to and responsibly participate in the digital world.
• 2.3.b Evaluate Resources for Credibility - Establish a learning culture that promotes curiosity and critical examination of online resources, and fosters digital literacy and media fluency.
• 2.3.c Teach Safe, Legal, Ethical Practices - Mentor students in safe, legal and ethical practices with digital tools and the protection of intellectual rights and property.
• Standard 2.4  Collaborator: Educators dedicate time to collaborate with both colleagues and students to improve practice, discover and share resources and ideas, and solve problems.
• 2.4.b Learn Alongside Students: Collaborate and co-learn with students to discover and use new digital resources, and diagnose and troubleshoot technology issues.
• Standard 2.6 Facilitator: Educators facilitate learning with technology to support student achievement of the ISTE Standards for Students.
• 2.6.d Model and Nurture Creativity: Model and nurture creativity and creative expression to communicate ideas, knowledge or connections.

Thinking Skills

Thinking comes in many forms . . .  

us.123rf.com

Sometimes, it just requires remembering the capital of Iowa or where you put your keys.  Other times, thinking is more complex as we decide how to apply the new skills we just learned. It might also involve analyzing the differences between two approaches to solving a problem. Thinking often requires us to evaluate different opportunities to create something uniquely original.

An educator's responsibility is to build these skills in our learners. We need to develop thinking skills that range all the way from remembering a simple fact to creating a complex project. As educators, we need to be aware of these different levels of thinking and mindfully create learning opportunities for our students that will develop thinking at all levels.

The basic level of thinking is called Lower-Order Thinking (LOTS).  This is the level where you memorize facts, poems, and equations. You are rewarded by remembering them when needed. Remembering things is useless unless you understand what these things mean. Knowing what things mean is important, but applying your knowledge to the real world takes another level of responsibility.

The more complex level of thinking is called Higher-Order Thinking (HOTS).  This is the level where you really have to be engaged.  You use what you know to analyze original situations. You evaluate them for good and bad.  You even take on the responsibility to use your background and knowledge to create new and original projects and ideas.

Knowing about these levels of thinking will enable you to create learning experiences this semester that will challenge your students. Basic facts (like the names of planets) are useful, but being able to list those facts is not enough to be valuable in real life.  You will need to provide your students with challenges where they can apply these basic facts in a new and creative way.

Bloom's Taxonomy
Yes, we know that you have probably learned about Bloom's Taxonomy in other classes but please don't "turn off."  Your mastery of teaching and learning at these levels is what will enhance the meaning of your students' learning.

These levels of thinking are captured in Bloom's Taxonomy. Developed in 1954 to identify different types of questions, this taxonomy has evolved into a model that classifies the various levels of thinking that we have been discussing.  (Click CC in the video below for closed captions)


As we progress through Ed Tech and Design, you will be asked to write statements that define what you want your learners to be able to do to prove that they have learned throughout your thematic unit.  These statements (Objectives) will use observable verbs to define the behavior you want your students to exhibit. The key to success is for you to use the appropriate observable verbs so that your learners will know what to do.  Here is a list of observable verbs that you will be able to use this week and next week as you learn about instructional design. These verbs are important.  Remember that the Verb is the Word.  This will all be discussed in more detail in this week's lecture.

Depths of Knowledge (DoK)

While Bloom's Taxonomy is used to categorize and evaluate the "Thinking Processes" students use to understand and apply knowledge, it is not directly employed to evaluate the complexity of students' knowledge and assessments teachers use for student evaluation. On the other hand, Depths of Knowledge (DoK) is a system specifically designed to assess the depth and complexity of tests and projects utilized by teachers in evaluating their student's understanding and skills. It helps educators create challenging tasks and assessments that accurately measure students' understanding and skills.

DoK involves 4 Levels:

Level 1: Recall and Reproduction - involves basic recall of facts or information.

Level 2: Basic Skills and Concepts - requires more than simple recall and includes applying skills or concepts.

Level 3: Strategic Thinking - involves reasoning, planning, and using evidence to solve problems.

Level 4: Extended Thinking - requires complex and abstract thinking, often over an extended period. 

The diagram below compares how the DOK can relate to Bloom's Taxonomy.

The following video explains the role that Bloom's Taxonomy and Depths of Knowledge play in learning and assessing thinking processes and levels of complexity in assessment.  
NOTE: The following video is created by the same company that created the Bloom's Taxonomy video above.  The intro theme and narrator are the same but the content is different.

Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson
Nurturing Higher-Order thinking is the basis for developing and rewarding creativity. Steven Johnson, one of our most innovative, popular thinkers explores (in exhilarating style) one of our key questions: Where do good ideas come from? Johnson provides the story of how we generate the ideas that push our careers, our lives, our education, our society, and our culture forward. 

So HOW do we integrate Higher-Order Thinking Skills into our Learning and Teaching?  Here are a few ideas by Sir Ken Robinson.

Collaboration in the 21st Century: Sir Ken Robinson
Watch how Sir Robinson explores ways that education can prepare students for the collaboration they will use in their future lives. This is an inspiring video that explains how collaboration supports innovation.  (Click CC in the video for closed captions)

Systematic Instructional Design and Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

This set of Readings, Watchings, Listenings, and Doings (RWLDs) is designed to prepare you for the lecture on "Systematic Instructional Design and Universal Design for Learning." It is meant to help you plan your Thematic Unit.

This post will focus on 5 terms: 

• Systematic Instructional Design (SID)
• Backward Design
• Understanding by Design (UbD)
• Observable Verbs
• Universal Design For Learning (UDL)

What is Systematic Instructional Design (SID)?

It is a methodical (systematic) approach to planning and creating (designing) educational experiences
that guide learners toward specific goals. By following a structured process, SID ensures that every element of the lesson (instruction) is organized, clear, and tailored to meet the unique needs of your students. This approach also supports continuous improvement, as ongoing evaluation and feedback help refine and enhance the learning experience.

Designing Your Instruction ...backward

Generated with AI

It's just common sense to begin with the end in mind when you are designing instruction. Begin by defining what you want your students to learn and plan your instruction to that result. This is called Backward Design.

If you don't know where you are going,
how will you know when you get there?

Let’s compare Systematic Instructional Design (SID) to planning a road trip:

1. Decide the Destination (Backward Design)

• Just like with a road trip, you start by deciding where you want to go. This is the end goal—where you want your learners to end up. In SID, this means defining clear learning objectives.
• Backward Design: You think about the destination first, and then plan everything else around it. In teaching, this means figuring out what you want students to know or do by the end, and then working backward to plan the journey.

        2. Understand Your Travelers (Learner analysis)

• You need to know who’s coming on the trip—how much they already know, their interests, and how they like to travel. This is like understanding your learners, their background knowledge, unique needs, and learning styles.
  

3. Map Out the Route (Content Sequencing and Structuring)

• Now, plan the best way to get to your destination. Do you want to take the scenic route or the fastest highway? In SID, this is organizing your content and activities in a logical sequence, and scaffolding it from simple to complex.

4. Pack the Essentials (Instructional Strategies)

• Make sure you have everything you need—maps, snacks, gas money. In SID, this is about choosing the right teaching methods, tools, and materials to support learning. 
• Strategies may include direct instruction, collaborative learning, problem-based learning, and use of multimedia

5. Plan Checkpoints. (Assessment and Evaluation)

• Along the way, you’ll check your progress—are you still on track? This is like using formative assessments to see if learners are understanding the material as you go. 
• Use formative assessments to provide ongoing feedback and summative assessments to evaluate overall learning outcomes

6. Enjoy the Journey (Implementation)

• Now you’re on the road, following your plan. This is the actual teaching part, where you deliver the lessons. You’re confident in your journey because you planned it backward from the destination. The trip is designed to ensure you reach your final goal.

7. Reflect on the Trip (Evaluation)

• When you reach your destination, reflect on how the trip went. Did everything go as planned? This is like evaluating whether your teaching was effective—did the learners achieve the goals?

8. Improve for the Next Time

• Learn from the trip to make your next one even better. In SID, use feedback and results to refine your teaching methods. 
• Use the data from evaluations to make ongoing improvements to the instructional design process.
• Ensure that the instruction remains relevant and effective as learner needs and technology evolve.

Makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?

Understanding by Design

Backward Design is the basis for an instructional design system called Understanding by Design.

Understanding by Design is a 3 parts framework that provides direction for unit lesson planning

    1. Identify Desired Results (outcomes)

• What do you want students to know after the lessons?

• What do you want your students to be able to do after the lessons?

    2. Determine Acceptable Evidence 

• What performance will indicate that your students have reached the desired level of proficiency

    3. Create Your Learning Plans to achieve the outcomes

• Develop your Learning Plan (instruction)

• Develop your Learning Activities (experiences) 

Bernajean Porter does a good job of explaining the aspects of Understanding by Design. The most significant point that she makes is that starting with the "End in Mind" is just common sense. (Pay SPECIAL ATTENTION to the B.F.O.)

Measure Success through Observable Verbs

Observable verbs are action words used to describe specific behaviors or actions that can be seen or measured.

For example, 

if you want to check if your students understand the water cycle, you would use observable verbs to create assessments that clearly show whether they grasp the concept. Instead of asking if they "understand" the water cycle, you would ask them to perform specific tasks that demonstrate their understanding: 

• Identify (or label) the different stages of the water cycle in a diagram
• Describe what happens during the evaporation stage
• Create a simple model of the water cycle using household items and demonstrate how water moves through the cycle

If you want to check if your students have learned the multiplication table, you would use observable verbs to create assessments that reveal their proficiency. 

• Fill in the missing numbers in this multiplication table for 1 through 12
• Solve the following problems: 6 × 9, 4 × 7, and 8 × 5
• If you buy 3 packs of pencils and each pack contains 12 pencils, calculate how many pencils do you have in total?

Using observable verbs helps ensure that learning objectives and assessments are clear and focused on what students can do, making it easier to observe and measure their progress and success.

Observable verbs help ensure that learning goals are specific, measurable, and focused on tangible outcomes.

Here is a link to observable verbs that you might use to evaluate how well your students have learned a topic. Tinyurl.com/ObservableVerbs.

Achieving your desired results is not always an easy task. Your students all have different skill levels and learning preferences. It is important that we present new information and engage our students in learning using a variety of approaches.
This strategy is called Universal Design for Learning

Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

Generated with AI

Effective Instructional Design can only be successful if you consider the learning needs of your learners. Your learners do not all have the same preferences for ways to learn, so you need to consider various ways that new ideas and skills are introduced and how your learners can engage in mastering this content.

Key principles of UDL include:

1. Multiple Means of Engagement: Offer various ways to motivate and involve learners.

• Examples:
• Choice: Allow students to choose between different project topics or formats (e.g., written report, presentation, or video).
• Interest-Based Learning: Incorporate topics that align with students' interests to increase motivation.
• Gamification: Use educational games or simulations to make learning more engaging and interactive.

1. Multiple Means of Representation: Present information in different formats to support comprehension.

• Examples:
• Visuals and Text: Use diagrams, charts, and images along with written explanations to convey information.
• Audio Support: Provide audio recordings or text-to-speech options for reading materials.
• Interactive Tools: Use interactive simulations or models to illustrate complex concepts (e.g., virtual lab experiments).

1. Multiple Means of Action and Expression: Allow learners to demonstrate their understanding in various ways.

• Examples:
• Different Formats: Let students submit assignments in various formats, such as written reports, oral presentations, or multimedia projects.
• Assistive Technology: Provide tools like speech-to-text software or graphic organizers to help students express their ideas.
• Flexible Assessment: Offer different types of assessments (e.g., quizzes, essays, or creative projects) to measure understanding based on students’ strengths.

The goal of UDL is to make learning accessible and effective for everyone by providing flexible learning options that can be customized to individual needs.

The Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) is a leading organization in the field of UDL. Read about CAST and the UDL Guidelines.

Here is a 5-minute introductory video on UDL.  

 

Visit (and bookmark for later) Universal Design for Learning (UDL): A teacher’s guide

Consider how we use Multiple Means of Representation in our Ed Tech and Design class. You are introduced (engaged) to new ideas through written and spoken media. The content is Represented in multiple formats. You are provided multiple ways to Act upon your new knowledge and Express your learning.

You should consider developing instruction that integrates a variety of methods of instruction including written text, speaking, listening, watching, and creating (to name a few.) This will be discussed further in the lecture that you will watch.

Putting It All Together with TPACK

We have already introduced TPACK, but Instructional Design is a good place to consider how we can most effectively integrate Technology, Pedagogy (teaching skills), and Content Knowledge (TPACK).

SID involves systematically planning, designing, implementing, and evaluating instruction. TPACK fits into this process by ensuring that technology is effectively integrated into each step.

TPACK enhances UDL by providing diverse, technology-driven ways to engage students, represent content, and allow expression.

Together, TPACK, UDL, and SID create a robust framework that helps educators design and deliver blanaced instruction that is both effective and inclusive, leveraging technology to meet diverse learning needs 

Reproduced by permission of the publisher, © 2012 by tpack.org

Technology is NOT the Thing, It provides Opportunities.
Technology is the Thing that gets you to the Thing.
Dr. Zeitz         

An important point TPACK emphasizes is that Technology, Content, and Pedagogy are equally vital, with each offering an essential "piece of the puzzle" that together leads to Successful Learning.

                

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Additional Resources: 

These are not required, but you may find them helpful in understanding these concepts.

Watch this video which provides a brief introduction to TPACK in 2 minutes.