Use of Shape Tools

User
1st grade students studying the unit of Rocks, silt, sand, and pebbles.

Justification
While doing my own research on Rocks for the project I decided that pictures with some text would benefit my students the best. Only being in 1st grade I have some students that are not able to read so visuals are best for them. Each of the four words has a picture to go with it. Rocks between two hands represents that most often to pick up a rock two hands are needed. Each of the other three words, pebbles, sand, and silt all have rock in them.

The visual for pebbles is one hand with two fingers acting as if they were getting ready to grab something. This represents that a pebble is small enough to be picked up between two fingers.

The visual for sand is gears that would be grinding up a rock to make it small, so small that a single grain of sand would have to be seen using a magnifying glass.

The visual for Silt is the word sand and water. Silt is sand and water mixed together.

For the unit it is important to know that they are all tied together and are all made of the same basic characteristics. The main thing that they all have in common is that they all descend from what we know and call rock.

User Test
When I showed this to the other teachers they all agreed that this would be a great visual and reminder of what each of the words mean, especially those students who struggle to read. It is also a great visual for those students who can read and have a photographic memory to be able to remember the graphics associated with each of the words.

Typography

Justification

User: Students in 1st grade just learning about Silt, Sand, Pebbles, and Rocks.

The 4 words shown in the picture will be the focus of a unit for the 1st grade science curriculum. While working on the project I changed many parts of it many different times until I found what I knew would work for my students. I decided to use 4 font types in order for my students to see that each of the words and "dirt" types were different. For silt, I used a wide Sans font because often times silt cracks into wide areas. The font for Sand was chosen because the pieces around the word depict how sand is really small and scatters everywhere. The word pebbles is in a font that is rounded on each of the points. This is because pebbles don't come to a point. All their edges are rounded. Finally, the word rocks is very jagged and very pointed. This is because that is the way that we see most rocks. I put them all vertically because each one builds upon the previous type. I used a font size of 125 for each of the words. Each of the words has it's own picture depicting what you would actually see when you are looking at that element. Silt was used for silt, sand was used for sand, pebbles were used for pebbles, and 3 major rock types were used for rocks: igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic, in that order of the word. After reading about type size and looked at the visual diagram (pgs 240-241) I evaluated where my students were. As I project it from the computer onto a screen, yes,  this may seem large for students in the front of the room but for those in the back of the room this will improve their legibility (pg. 227).

When I showed the draft to my other 1st grade colleagues, who will also be teaching this same type of unit, each of them had their own opinion about what they liked or didn't like. As I finished and made the final product I took each of their thoughts and decided what I liked or didn't like as well. I only had one type of rock type showing in the word Rocks. Many of them asked if I could make more than one in the word. I was able to make that work. Most of them liked the word pebbles because of the way it looks smooth just as pebbles often look and feel. They really enjoyed the word sand as it really could look like sand.

I never realized how much time, planning, and knowledge goes into creating an image to use in textbooks, etc. As I continue making graphics for my students, I now have a broader depth of knowledge to help me help them.

Lohr, L. (2008). Creating graphics for learning and performance: Lessons in visual literacy (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson Education, Inc.

506: Universal Design

Week 2 Project Instructions

How to Tie a Tie

As I was trying to decide what visual literacy concept to choose for this assignment I watched some family members putting their ties on. I thought to myself, I have no idea how to tie a tie myself. I have seen it done thousands of times but never have I been able to figure it out. I decided it was finally time to learn. I browsed the internet to find different visuals and although there were many designs available, this is the one I found to be the most helpful.

I consider this image to be an Organizational Design. It "helps learners understand the structure, sequence, and hierarchy of information." (Lohr, 2008, pg. 18) It gives a visual understanding for those wanting to learning how to tie a tie. It clearly communicates each step with the visuals of the arrows and the numbers in order going from left to right.

Lohr, L. (2008). Creating graphics for learning and performance. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.
http://www.ties.com