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The doubting school man will find stimulus, and the enthusiast a warning, in the message of this educational psychologist
FACT and FABLE in VISUAL EDUCATION
Frank N. Freeman
Professor of Educational Psychology, School of Education, University of Chicago
THE ADVANTAGES of visual education have often been presented in a highly abstract and theoretical manner. There are signs that many school administrators are doubtful of the correctness and relevancy of some of the arguments that are advanced in support of visual education. They desire in place of these very general considerations a more detailed and specific statement of the advantages of the visual method, and of the kinds of material to which it is particularly adapted. This attitude is supported by experience with various types of visual material, which shows that they do not always possess the superior advantages that are claimed for them.
Much of the discussion setting forth the psychological basis of the advantage of visual presentation very greatly overshoots the mark. When it is asserted, for example, that ninetenths of our experience comes from vision and that therefore the visual method must greatly predominate, a statement is made that is either without support or without meaning from a psychological point of view. It might be shown by psychological analysis that the advantage of one
mode of presentation or another cannot be determined or stated in any such wholesale fashion. The experience of those who have studied various modes of presenting words in teaching spelling has demonstrated this fact.
Visual methods have, however, certain undoubted advantages. Many aspects of things can best be learned by seeing them. When the thing cannot be seen, a picture or diagram furnishes a good substitute for actual sight of the object.
Features of objects that can best be grasped by sight are the form of the object, and the relations of parts to each other or of one object to another. In other words, spatial relations of an object or of its parts can best be grasped through sight. These spatial relations are particularly important to an understanding of the mechanical working of a machine. They are also particularly important in understanding the structure of a complex object.
It is not necessary to give many illustrations to prove these latter statements. If we wish to find out how a steam engine or a gas engine works or how the pressure on the pedals of a bicycle causes the wheel to revolve, we can gain this understanding most readily by looking at the objects in question, or at diagrams of them. Again, if we wish to gain a clear idea of the structure of a building, a piece of furniture, or the body of an animal, we again have recourse to sight either of the object itself or of a picture or diagram of it.
The advent of motion pictures has opened up a new field in making it possible to represent the relations of parts of objects, or of different objects, in motion. This method furnishes an excellent means of Studying the motion with greater leisure, and consequently with greater attention to details, than would be possible even in the sight of the object itself. Furthermore, exceedingly rapid or exceedingly slow movement can be brought within the range of our apprehension by means of motion pictures. The use of the diagram in motion pictures in the form of the animateddrawing method extends also the advantages of the diagrammatic mode of presentation to motion itself. Frequently a diagram gives
a much better notion of structure and relationship than the sight of an object itself. The animated diagram does the same thing for motion.
The visual method has long been recognized as a means of showing more abstract relationships between facts that could not otherwise be shown as well. For example, the trend of prices or the trend of wages can be shown by means of a graph, so that the essential features can be grasped almost instantly. The distribution of a large number of individual measures may be shown by a diagram so that the main features can be taken in at a glance. Distribution charts are now commonplaces in education. They might perhaps be adapted also to some of the subjects that are taught in the schools.
These are merely random illustrations of the specific advantage of the visual method in presenting certain types of facts. A systematic experimentation would render much more complete and exact our knowledge of the various types of fact that could best be presented visually, and would also indicate the limits of this method. There are certain advantages claimed for the visual method that in all probability are fictitious, or at least do not attach to the methods now in use. It is claimed, for example, that moving pictures are interesting to the children beyond all comparison with other methods. It is supposed that this superior interest is due to some mysterious appeal made by visual sensations. Observation does not indicate that this advantage is at all as marked as is commonly believed. We must remember that visual methods are new and that novelty always awakens interest. Furthermore, the type of subject-matter that has been presented by motion pictures has been largely narrative and sometimes sensational. It is not correct to compare this kind of subject-matter with that which prevails in the school. When the same type of intellectual contact is presented visually as orally, it is found that the appeal depends more upon the skill with which the material is organized than upon the sense through which the presentation is made. If the mere fact that material is presented through vision and by means of movement is relied upon to constitute the chief appeal, it will be found that confidence has been misplaced.
Another common statement is that visual methods, and particularly motion pictures, hold the child's attention much better than oral presentation. Here again the emphasis is upon the wrong factor in the situation. If the presentation is well organized and adapted to the child, it will hold his attention — otherwise it will not. In fact, there are certain elements present in the ordinary class exercise but not in motion-picture presentation and that are very effective in holding the attention of the children. One of these is the personality of the teacher. Another is the interchange of thought and speech between the different members of the class. Moreover, the skillful teacher constantly adapts the presentation to the class, and increases or decreases the rapidity with which a fact is presented, or introduces more or less detail according as the children seem to require it.
These problems have been presented by way of illustration. Visual education is in a position to profit very materially by the study of its advantages and disadvantages, and by a study of the