Simple discriminations are involved in many functional skills; additionally, they are components of conditional discriminations (identity and arbitrary matching-to-sample), which are involved in a wide array of other important performances. Many individuals with severe disabilities have difficulty acquiring simple discriminations with standard…

So far, pedagogy has not formed its own unique visual angle and thinking mode to understand humans and the world in general; consequently, it is always counting upon other subjects, which is the root of the crisis in pedagogy. Focusing on the "visual angle" and "thinking mode", this article puts forward a new proposition…

Spatial skills are known to vary widely among normal individuals. This project was designed to address whether these individual differences are differentially related to large-scale environmental learning from route (ground-level) and survey (aerial) perspectives. Participants learned two virtual environments (route and survey) with limited…

Discusses the best-known examples of slow-scan television; its development; its relationship to other types of visual media; its effectiveness as an instructional method; its use in teleconferencing; slow-scan television systems and their uses; factors of slow-scan picture quality, frame frequency, and bandwidth; origination and display…

This article discusses combining two effective instructional methods (Classwide Peer Tutoring and a spelling strategy) to help students acquire and maintain spelling competence inside and outside of the classroom. The spelling strategy, SPELLER, is a seven-step strategy that uses visual imagery, systematic testing, and auditory reinforcement.…

For a visual generation of students, slides are an effective learning and teaching tool and a constant stimulus for writing, reading, and speaking activities. Ways in which slides have been effectively incorporated into foreign language instruction lessons are described. (CB)

This article discusses the increasing incidence of cortical visual impairments, resulting from medical advancements making possible the survival of critically ill children with severe brain damage. Discussed are the prevalence of multiple handicaps, formation of visual concepts, foreground/background distinction, potential for mainstreaming, use…

Discusses the suitability of multimedia technology for the representation of complex visual events in the classroom and describes a program that uses videodisk and HyperCard to teach students about the factors involved in the creation of theatrical performances. Principles to guide the design of multimedia applications for the classroom are…

Our social worlds are visually saturated. A feature of post-modern society is its relentless traffic in images, often borrowed from diverse times and places, and patched together in ever changing ways. This traffic serves commercial purposes, shapes identities, and increasingly stands in for reality itself. As a newspaper columnist noted, "most of…

The use of visual representation to learn science can be traced to Louis Agassiz, Harvard Professor of Zoology, in the mid-19th century. In Agassiz's approach, students were to study nature through carefully observing, drawing and then thinking about what the observations might add up to. However, implementation of Agassiz's student-centered…

Discusses the findings of a recent study concerning the ability of an infant to see an object as a symbol. Reports that infants between 36 and 39 months old significantly outperformed informed infants between 30 and 32 months old on a symbolic task. (TW)

Reports on a study in which the symbolic relation between a scale model and the larger space that it represents was displayed by two groups of young children. Three-year-old children outperformed 2.5-year-olds in finding an object in a room after seeing an analogous object hidden in a model. (TW)

Describes an evaluator's experiences in three art workshops for fourth graders at the Carnegie Museum of Art. Workshop participants demonstrated significant intellectual growth and visual learning. (AM)

Outlining, making data tables, and sequencing events are commonly used for teaching specific topics in science but not as general learning tools. Discusses how the teaching and application of these visual representation techniques helps students realize their usefulness as learning tools and to learn more efficiently. (LZ)

Describes Euroland, a virtual world that was generated within the context of a joint research project between The Netherlands and Italy aimed at the facilitation of cross-cultural communication and collaborative knowledge building between schools using a variety of communication formats, including text-based versus visual and synchronous versus…