Who designs the classroom’s images? Study of visual culture diversity at three Valencian schools

Abstract

The research reported on here elaborated on the effects that images displayed on the walls have in schools as a variable in evaluating the educational quality. Mixed methods were used to analyse the images displayed on the walls of 27 classrooms to determine their provenance and authorship. The results show quantitative, qualitative and aesthetical values of the school visual culture, thanks to the numerous photographic series (resembling in graphs) which are a testimony of each classroom. After the typologies of the displayed images at the schools had been documented, it was demonstrated that images mostly come from the school products industry and from faculty members.i The kind of analysis and the conclusions that were obtained could be considered in other contexts of schools with cultural diversity. Four alternatives are proposed in order to improve schools’ visual culture diversity: 1) consensus between the entire educative community – both adults and children selecting which images should adorn the classroom walls; 2) an increasing of external images, but generated by students and teachers about their personal experiences to increase the sense of belonging in the classroom; 3) a greater presence of internal images created by specialised agents, that enrich the learning processes, diversity, iconography and style of the images; 4) the emphasis of elementary teachers’ visual education to integrate images pedagogically.

Do student teachers see what learners see? – Avoiding instructional dissonance when designing worksheets

“…In addition, we acknowledge that learning support materials, whether print and non-print, have manifest and latent functions (Alonso-Sanz & Rueda 2021;McEneaney 2004;Peacock & Cleghorn 2004;Prochner, Cleghorn & Green 2008). A definite function is to give learners access to the subject knowledge that curriculum experts and policymakers have decided is essential.…”

Development of Visual Culture in Product Design with Application of Digital Mining Technology

“…Visual culture reflects the visual experience of our daily life that can convey beliefs, attitudes and values, and it can be understood as a meaningful, pulsating and traceable image of daily life [11]. Under the inducement of visual consumption, an important phenomenon in visual culture is the great importance attached to appearance, and industrial design products characterized by appearance aesthetics should become the object of attention of visual culture [12].…”