Teaching, Learning, and Visual Literacy

Billie Eilam is Head of the Department of Learning, Instruction, and Teacher Education at the University of Haifa, Israel. Professor Eilam's research focuses on cognitive aspects of visualization in teaching, learning and curriculum, particularly in the science domain, and on applying theories to authentic learning situations. She has co-authored several books in Hebrew on the subjects of ecology and inquiry skills, presents regularly at international educational conferences, and publishes widely in leading refereed journals including Learning and Instruction, The Learning Sciences, Curriculum Studies and Contemporary Educational Psychology. Her latest published work examines visualization in biology. Professor Eilam has been actively involved in education reform efforts throughout her career, serving as the Head of the Department of Teacher Education and guiding several grant-funded curriculum development projects.

• Preface. Part I. Introduction: 1. Dualities of visual literacy: the double-faced Janus image; Part II. The State of the Art in Visual Literacy among Teachers and Students in Schools and within Today's Visual Culture: 2. A day in teachers' work: qualitative research and case illustrations on teaching and learning with VRs in today's schools; 3. Students' ideas about VRs over development; 4. Practising students' ideas about VRs and their uses; 5. The emergence of visual literacy and the global visual culture; Part III. Teachers' Visual Literacy Programs: Rationales, Lacunae, and Planning: 6. The rationale for implementing explicit visual education for teachers; 7. Integration of VRs into teacher education programs: past, present, and future; Part IV. The Nature of VRs and their Impact on Learning: 8. Some aspects of human perception that teachers should understand; 9. Symbolic language: signs and sign types; 10. Visual representations: types and characteristics; 11. Learning with representations and multimedia: affordances and constraints; Part V. The Invisibility of VRs in Curriculum Materials: 12. VRs' influences on curricular concepts and theories; 13. A comprehensive schema for analyzing MRCMs; Part VI. A VR Curriculum Framework for Teacher Education: 14. Innovations in teacher education; 15. Proposed curriculum framework; 16. Possible exercises and tasks; Part VII. Epilogue: 17. An image of the future: the visually literate teacher.