The Importance of Teaching Visual Literacy to NonDesigners

1
The Importance of Teaching Visual Literacy to
Non-Designers

• Monika Zarzycka
• 2007 IGAEA Conference

2
Introduction

• Importance of Visual Literacy
• Required for business-oriented professionals
• Presentations, corporate communications,
  newsletters, business cards, websites
• Visual presentation of data charts, graphs,
  symbols

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Introduction

• Problem
• Many people are visually illiterate
• Not enough education/training in visual design
• Solution
• Offer courses in visual communications
• The Information and Logistics Technology (ILT)
  Department at the University of Houston (UH)
  offers a visual literacy course
• GRTC 3353 - Visual Communications Systems

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GRTC 3353

• GRTC 3353 is an introductory course that is
  required of all students in the UH ILT department
• Students are introduced to
• principles of graphic design
• typography and how to work with type
• scanning and digital photography
• color theory and use
• newsletter and newspaper design
• identity and advertising design

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GRTC 3353

• Students are also taught basic design concepts
  using Microsoft Word or Microsoft PowerPoint
• Not recommended as professional graphic design
  applications but acceptable as in-office
  applications
• Why Microsoft Word?
• Students learn design concepts without spending
  excessive class time learning new software
  programs that many of them would never use after
  the course

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GRTC 3353

• The course is divided into weekly 2-hour lectures
  and 3-hour lab sessions
• Lecture weekly quizzes, homework
• Lab Hands-on practice
• Assignments are designed to familiarize students
  with design concepts introduced during lecture
  and to evaluate their ability to apply design
  concepts to their own work
• Simple invitations, letterhead, business card

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The Study

• A study to assess the effectiveness of the GRTC
  3353 course
• Student projects were evaluated
• Projects designed at the beginning of the
  semester (pre-course)
• Similar projects completed at the end of the
  semester (post-course)

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Research Questions

• Major Research Questions
• Did the GRTC 3353 course
• make any impact on students use of typography?
• make any impact on students adherence to design
  principles?
• make any impact on students use of color?
• prepare students to create more effective visual
  work at the end of the semester as compared to
  their skill-level at the beginning of the course?

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Assumptions Limitations

• Assumptions
• The students had no previous experience in
  graphic design
• The students put an equal amount of effort into
  both projects that were evaluated
• Limitations
• The number of students enrolled in the course
• No control group

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Participants

• Participants were 23 students
• 1 student graphic design or a related area, but
  had no previous experience in design
• 16 students (70) Technology Leadership and
  Supervision
• 4 students (17) Logistics Technology
• 2 students (8) other fields unrelated to
  graphic design

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Pre-course Project

• A wedding invitation
• It was given at the beginning of Fall 2006
• Students received the text for the invitation
• Students were asked to format the text and turn
  it into an invitation
• No additional instructions were given

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Post-course Project

• Students from the pre-course were given the same
  file to create the wedding invitation in the end
  of the semester
• They received exactly the same text and
  instructions

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Judges

• Two art directors
• A print products manager
• A graphic designer
• All were chosen by the Fogarty Klein Monroe (FKM)
  Agency, the largest advertising firm in Houston

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The Judging Process

• A week before judging
• The researcher took note of which project
  belonged to which student
• The judges were not given that information
• The researcher collected all pre-course and
  post-course projects, shuffled them, and numbered
  them randomly

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The Evaluative Instrument

• The evaluation sheet
• four qualitative items for each project
• A five-point Likert Scale to judge three
  questions related to participants
• use of typography
• adherence to design principles
• use of color
• The fourth item asked judges to mark either Yes
  or No if they considered the work to be an
  effective piece of visual communication

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Data Analysis

• A comparison between responses (46) was conducted
  by examining individual answers, and
• by placing each answer in either the pre-course
  or post-course cluster
• Both the pre-course and post-course projects
  were gathered into two groups and analyzed
• Each of the judges responses was separated by
  question and placed in either the pre-course or
  post-course cluster

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Results
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Results

• Q1 Did the GRTC 3353 make any impact on
  students use of typography?
• Yes
• Pre-course 2.36
• Post-course entries 3.14

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Results

• Q2 Did the GRTC 3353 make any impact on
  students adherence to design principles?
• Yes
• Pre-course 2.09
• Post-course entries 3.08

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Results

• Q3 Did the GRTC 3353 make any impact on
  students use of color?
• Yes
• Pre-course 2.21
• Post-course entries 2.92

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Results

• Q4 Did the GRTC 3353 make any impact on the
  effectiveness of students work at the end of the
  semester as compared to similar project completed
  before taking the course?
• Yes
• Pre-course 34.78
• Post-course entries 80.43

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Conclusion

• GRTC 3353 had an impact on students ability to
  produce more effective work
• Over 80 post-course projects were judged
  effective
• Only 35 pre-course projects were judged
  effective

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Recommendations

• A larger sample
• The participants could be compared to a control
  group of individuals who have not taken a visual
  communication course at all
• Administer a similar study to both online and
  face-to-face sections of the same course and
  compare the results
• Administer a similar study to students who are
  enrolled in the same course but have different
  lab instructors

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The End

• GRTC website www.graphics.tech.uh.edu
• Q A