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O 9
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The possibilities of visual aids in the hands of a competent teacher were revealed in a flash.
A little thought will bear this out. Most people are predominantly eye-minded : and we recognise this in daily life when we want to give them some exact information and ensure that they grasp it. We are not content with telling them : for instance, w7e try, more or less successfully, to make out a plan when showing people the way; maps and diagrams are the normal accompaniment of the various branches of science; and in the most abstract of them all, a figure is essential.
Then there is the question of interest. What is a book without pictures? Yet we talk and lecture about things that have happened far away or long ago with never a picture to enliven the description or shift the children’s gaze to anything more attractive or illuminating than our own faces. But if we take the trouble to find and put up a picture — an Indian Bazaar, the Quest of the Golden Fleece, or the Last Supper — we all know7 the difference it makes.
Visual aids enrich our lessons. Small, rare and unique pictures can be displayed, and we can be sure that every member of the class sees them and knows what to look for, without fear of the class disintegrating as it tends to do if the pictures have to be passed round. In this way children can be educated to appreciate contemporary pictures, old prints and illuminations. Microscopic slides can also be projected, and w7e can be certain that the children see what they ought to see. Processes can be speeded up — a voyage round the world, the growth of a tree : or slowed down — to demonstrate the steps in woodwork or needlework. Sight and sound can be married — not only in the sound film, but by showing the words on the screen for choral work, for example, or using pictures at a sing-song. The writer recalls the instance of a teacher who prepared her children for their First Holy Communion in this way: the pages of the booklet they wrere to use w7ere shown on the epidiascope, and the teacher explained the pictures and prayers, while each child could follow in its own little book as well. Many similar ideas will occur to readers.
Visual aids therefore help to make learning easier, more exact and more interesting. They save and economise effort, thus liberating energy for further work — in a word, they improve our lessons.
They have their limitations, however. Like all aids they are but means to an end and must be subordinated to it, not used for their own sake (with one exception as will be shown later). The use of the moving picture, in particular, is strictly limited : it should never be used where a still picture would do as well, nor should sound be employed without good reason.
It is time to ask what exactly is meant by \isual aids. They can be anything from a postage stamp to television, and include the whole range of pictorial and diagrammatic material: but the term as at present used is applied in particular to the mechanical devices for enlarging and projecting illustrative material. These