I chose to include the infographic that I created during the 679 class as my second artifact. I chose this project because I am proud of how the final product turned out. I am even more proud of this project particularly because I originally made some mistakes and had to go back and make some changes. Making these mistakes was a big learning experience for me and I think I understand the process much better for having made those mistakes. I now know what kinds of things should be included in a good infographic and which things should be avoided. I feel that now I am in a much better position to help my students as they work through their own infographics in my class.
The biggest challenge I had with creating this activity was using fewer words and more images. “Infographics are traditionally viewed as visual elements such as signs, charts, maps, or diagrams that aid comprehension of a given text-based content” (Ross, 2009). I am not used to doing activities like this and that was a hard lesson for me to learn. I wanted to explain myself using words, when I should be focused much more on images conveying my message in an infographic. I believe though, that my final product does a great job of this and I definitely learned my lesson.
I can use an activity like this for many different topics that I teach. While this particular one is designed for comparing two digital tools, the principles can apply to many other topics as well. One aspect of this activity that I really like are the visuals. Most of the students I teach are more visual learners so I think a project like this will really help them. Also, in order to create a well done infographic, you really have to understand the topic. It is not enough to just copy and paste an article from the internet. The students have to understand the concepts in order to choose relevant images, graphics, and charts. “The combination of verbal and visual learning styles has been shown to ultimately increase students’ retention of basic skills by 21% and higher order skills by 20%” (McGuire, 2015). This type of activity is perfect for many of the science topics I teach and will lead to higher learning and retention. I will definitely try to include more activities like this one into my teaching in the future.
I have learned so much about infographics and assessments from taking this class. Without this class, I would not have gained so many tips and tricks for including more visuals and higher thinking into my classroom. I would definitely not have the same confidence in creating and using infographics without this class. These ideas are ones that I will carry with me the rest of my career and I am thankful to have gained so much knowledge over the last few weeks. I wouldn’t have been as successful in this class without my classmates. Their ideas and thoughts have helped me so much. Having discussions with other teachers that are in the same position as me was very beneficial and provided a lot of different viewpoints I would not have thought of myself. I learned quite a bit in this class, and look forward to learning much more as this program progresses.
References:
McGuire, S. (2015, November 05). How To Use Infographics As Multimodal Learning Tools. Retrieved July 25, 2018, from https://www.teachthought.com/pedagogy/how-to-use-infographics-as-multimodal-learning-tools/
Ross, A. (2009, June 7). InfoGraphic Designs: Overview, Examples and Best Practices. Retrieved July 25, 2018, from http://www.instantshift.com/2009/06/07/infographic-designs-overview-examples-and-best-practices/
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