Learning Design Principles by Mike Tailor - from Stella's Blog

Learning Design Principles by Mike Tailor

The video on this site provided the reader with a greater understanding of the role of the brain in integration multi-media into your instructional designing and attempts to explain why the use of text and graphics are important in designing a course.

As indicated in the above blog on this site, the video presentation on the site does provide us with principles to explain and demonstrate the effectiveness of integrating the use of pictures with words and provide us with a "to do" and a "not to do" lists. For instance, it tells us the we should not split information or split text and the graphics that goes with it as in these instances, we are also splitting the readers' attention and therefore making it more difficult for the reader to integrate the materials. According to the Taylor, the use of pairing text with a picture makes the text more memorable.

For those us in an Instructional Design class, the blog/video will prove very useful in helping us to better understand the role the brain plays in integrating, memorizing and recalling information, not only on a whiteboard or a text book, but more importantly on a computer screen.

I believe that in designing online courses, the designer can use illustrations animation and graphics as well to draw the audience's attention or alert the student to key information.

My research into these as they relate to computer based instruction identified that graphics as being

#attentional - pictures or graphics attract attention to the material or direct attention within the material - hopefully using graphics in this way will heighten the likelihood that a user will remember the material.

# affective - pictures enhance enjoyment or affect emotions and attitudes


# cognitive - the cognitive use of graphics involves using pictures to increase comprehension (for example, providing elaboration for a text explanation), to improve recollection and retention, or to provide information that is not otherwise available

(Here's a section from the cellsalive.com website - Enhancing the Microscope Image which really uses graphics effectively to elaborate on text points)


# compensatory - the compensatory use of pictures involves helping poor readers by adding pictorial clues to decode text


From my experiences, I believe that the use of use multi-media should be done with due consideration to the end user. Designers should ensure that the graphics they use serve a purpose, if they don't they might distract the user. Consideration must also be paid to type of system used to prepare the course versus the system being used to view the course. A lot of graphics may cause a system to react very slowly.

If you are uploading video and audio transmissions they should be accompanied by a written transcription. Like me, some students prefer to read that watch or listen to information and others may prefer to have a written transcript to refer to at some time.

Use bold text, underlined text, italicized text, colored text, or all capital letters only when it is drawing the reader’s eye to something meaningful. Over-using these elements detracts from their meaningful use. When the all of the text is large, bold or colored, it fails to draw the reader’s eye to any particular items that you want to stick out.

Design pages to be esthetically appealing and professional-looking.




References

Levie, W.H. & Lentz, R. (1982). Effects of text illustrations: A review of research. Educational Communications and Technology Journal, 30 (4), 195-232.