" To enhance undergraduate learning in the liberal arts by promoting use of library special collections"

Participating Institutions

EYES IN CONNECTICUT: DEVELOPING 21st CENTURY VISUAL LITERACY TO FOCUS ON SPECIAL COLLECTIONS

The Teagle Special Collections Project / Workshop Two

Yale University
March 3, 2006
9:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.

Sponsorship for this workshop was provided by the Teagle Foundation grant for leading Connecticut partnerships in enhancement of liberal arts education and also supported by the Davies Educational Foundation grant on collections based teaching and learning at Yale. Yale faculty and staff provided the lectures of the workshop.The day-long workshop was held on March 3, 2006 in the Sterling Memorial Library, and convened by Ann Okerson, Associate University Librarian, Associate University Librarian for Collections and International Programs, and Danuta Nitecki, Associate University Librarian Public Services, Yale University.

In her introduction, Ms. Nitecki provided a short characterization of the sponsors, who have provided the library with extraordinary support in expanding ways to educate students in the basic methods of research and the use of the rich, special and specialized collections of resources available at the libraries both here and in Connecticut.

William Rando, Director of the Graduate Teaching Center, opened the workshop with an introduction to visual literacy in the classroom. His presentation was titled Special Collections: Out of the Stacks and Into the Classroom. His definitions of visual literacy provided a useful framework analyzing the contributions of the other speakers at the workshop. Rando introduced the overarching term "visual fluency" to define what teachers want their students to learn with respect to images. The concept captures the research aspect of working with images related to information literacy, as well as the specific skills, needed to work with images. This approach much stresses what students will learn to do rather than what knowledge they will acquire. Visual fluency can be broken down into 4 competencies:

• Reading images - To be able to ‘read’ an image means to be able to identify elements of images, e.g. a dot, line, direction, motion, hue, saturation, etc. Another approach would be to investigate the general provenance of an image. Best teaching strategies focus on one approach.

After the lecture, a lively discussion followed, in which such issues were addressed as when to use an original or a representation; does writing about images require a separate set of skills; and why is it that we tend to treat images so differently (non critically) from text? Was this skill set neglected in our education? But, however "illiterate" we might be, Rando emphasized that visual fluency is certainly something that can be taught and learned.

The first example of how images can be used to provide evidence for historical developments was provided by Douglas W. Rae, Richard S. Ely Professor of Organization and Management, School of Management, with his presentation Using Images to Learn about the City. The speaker, who called himself "a refugee from the era of the 35 mm slide," indicated that using visual resources really changed his way of teaching, and that he now is heavily depending on visual materials in the classroom.

The University Libraries helped to create an inventory of visual images, of which he makes enormous use, like many of his colleagues.In his course on the Westinghouse Winchester repeating arms factory, Rae uses images to portray the drama of the strike in New Haven in 1979 and the key players in it. The story of all the factors that contributed to what happened in 1979 is centered on different themes through history and are discussed chronologically. Photographs, datasets and maps are used as evidence of historical evidence. Rae would argue that this method of teaching is appropriate for the current generation of students, which he characterizes as "post-literate." We are clearly moving into an era where people learn differently, and this is also apparent in some of the term papers.

A striking example of this is a term paper of a graduate student in the School of Art. In a nine minute film, she describes what she sees when flying in a plane over a straight line of 15 miles. The moving images provide insight in the impact of ‘distance’ on how people connect to information: one can describe a city, but it does not come alive until one gets down to what is going on a street corner, in a school, and so on.

In the Q&A portion of Rae's presentation, teaching of non linear progression was discussed, as well as the importance of providing comprehensive coherence through information layering in teaching critical thinking.

The next speaker, John Wargo, Professor of Environmental Risk Analysis & Policy Political Science, very literally demonstrated how images can be used as evidence in his presentation Electronic Imagery and Environmental Science.

The case Wargo presented was that of a course on former weapon storage on the island Vieques in Portorico, a research project he has been working on for five years. The question explored was how the islanders might have been exposed to pollutants over time. Information from different disciplines, including highly specialized resources, was needed to answer this question.What was it like before the navy landed at the island? What were possible ways of exposure to pollutants? Photographs and area maps were available, (a 1936 dataset that showed the situation before the navy arrived), and new knowledge in the form of historical overlays was created in order to track changes in the community over time. Other areas of research included the changes in the environment and the influence of the weather.Electronic information was critical for structuring the research and engaging students in the project, but no one was trained in finding and using the information.

For this kind of research, spatial resources and analysis are crucial, and visual and electronic images are increasingly used in teaching. Wargo concludes by stating that Google Earth is going to transform the public accessibility to visual imagery (which Stace Maples will demonstrate later in the day).

Pericles Lewis, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature, and Director of Undergraduate Studies in Literature, showed an approach from the Humanities in Teaching Modernism in Literature and the Modern Arts.

The speaker used his lecture on the modern British novel to discuss the role of images in teaching, and the different kinds of use his students make of Yale special collections.In a lecture on primitivism, the students are given a sense of the interaction among the various the arts: music, literature, painting, film, and dance. In addition, major themes of primitivism in modern art are linked with a socio-historical political background.

Visual resources are used as evidence of influence of different cultural developments on each other.For their research papers, students are asked to use primary materials from the Art Gallery or the Beinecke Library (e.g. a manuscript of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness). In addition a set of (scanned) archival materials, like memorabilia, is available through the Beinecke website.

And then there is the class website, through which information on the course, and images, are available. The lectures are illustrated by representations of originals that reside at Yale, but other sources are used as well, like a scene from H.G. Wells' The Time Machine.

Lewis's experience is that 20 images in one 45/50 minutes lecture are too much; he experiments with using a maximum of 10/15. He is very happy to get students into the Yale special collections and learn about galleries and archives as a place for discovery and research. Students seem to appreciate it, but it is still a challenge how to teach students how to work with the originals).

After the lecture, the audience was interested in learning more about how the students worked with the visual materials in their research. Lewis explains that curators gave tours and helped with "reading" visual resources (interpretation); or he would design questions that allow students to take a look at the archive or artistic material. For example, students were asked to compare representations of themes in the different arts. The experience suggests that students tend to use the materials they are pointed to but sometimes also come up with their own materials.

John Faragher, Arthur Unobskey Professor of American History, was one of the first people to take advantage of the library services that included digitizing thousands of images from the Yale collections on Western Americana at the Beinecke library. This resulted in revising the original course.In this presentation Teaching with Images from Yale Collection of Western Americana, an in-depth example of "close reading" of images is provided. In this particular lecture, MFaragher uses depictions of native Americans by Europeans to provide insight in the European view on this continent and its inhabitants. What is prominent in the images, what is left out and why? How do these images represent ideologies of that time? Students learn about why the images are what they are (understanding the images) by looking at the context: who created them, when, where, who was the audience?, etc.

Resources used include the first European image of America in a letter published by Columbus in 1494, in which the nakedness of the natives is predominant. This has a meaning: the absence of clothing becomes a metaphor of absence of civilization. Other examples include the Nurnberg Chronicle of 1493, Vespucci’s De Duovo Mundo (1505), 17th century books on the New World, and 16th century watercolors, depicting native Americans. Some images were first hand reports (watercolors), others interpretations of texts (Columbus). The different versions (e.g. engravings from watercolors) provide opportunity to compare the different versions of the images. In addition, there is the intertextuality of images, a fascinating story!

Faragher supports Rae's finding that students are good at reading images. This "visual generation" is accustomed to doing it. But it is crucial that visual resources are brought at a highly intellectual level, as evidence, not just as illustrations. His students work with digital images, particularly the originals (they are expected to use Yale Special Collections for their term paper). In his lectures, Faragher clearly links the images to the books of which they are a part. He thinks that the availability of digital images increases the use of the library collections, quite contradictory to what some might expect.

The next presentation, Writing for the Web, by English Lecturer Roberta Stuart, was a very interesting example of how to teach student to "speak" with images and form (web design) in teaching writing skills. In her writing course, Stuart aims to show students that research and writing are connected with reality outside the classroom. So she looks for topics that students are familiar with (e.g. student volunteering) and formats that they encounter, like texts on websites. For one of the writing courses, students had to design websites for voluntary agencies for which they already work. The resulting web-sites would be used by these agencies. Students had to conduct interviews, gain permission for photographs, etc., and they were taught design and tools. They had to apply design concepts and an appropriate way of writing (50% reduction of words!) to communicate their message.

Another course focuses on the "working poor" in New Haven. Here, students had to use images to explain medical specialisms for people with limited English language skills and for whom the medical infrastructure was new.In these writing courses, students learned about writing for public with an eye for the visual, with all the responsibility that is attached to it. Finding images is part of the work and important for the quality of the result.

In a discussion with the audience, the speaker explained that she introduces students to (special, visual) collections by having them find images themselves, and by providing a prize as an incentive. In addition, students are required to contact a librarian in special collections.

In his presentation How to Look at a Building, Sandy Isenstadt, Associate Professor of Art and School of Architecture, explained that in architecture, images play a complex role. They represent part of what a real three dimensional building is. You have to use many images, plus indications of physical relations to be able to visualize a building that you cannot experience by going there. In context of classroom one only has 2-D images to convey 3-D objects to help students develop 3-D visualization in minds.In looking at an image, you have to be clear about the strengths and limits of that particular image; what can it tell you and what not, how can it lie? And then there is a physical relationship with buildings (distance). Different images are of interest to different types of students:

And then there is one challenge left; how does one talk about images of unbuilt buildings?In the discussion that followed, the speaker mentioned as greatest challenge learning how to use tools for importing and presenting images. With regard to tailoring collections to his needs, Isenstadt emphasized that he likes to let the images he finds influence the intended content.

Stace Maples, Geographic Information Systems Assistant, Map CollectionGIS wizard Stace Maples (GIS Systems Assistant of Sterling’s Map Collection) demonstrated in his lecture Free and Easy: Using Spatial Data and Imagery for Instruction, that 3-D images might be available soon. He explored how new tools might help teachers to "speak with images" to create geospatial context. GIS systems are expensive and there is a steep learning curve, but there is a way to provide non-GIS users with the power to provide geo-spatial context for their teaching content: Google Earth.

Google Earth provides tools that are fairly easy to use, to place features (images, place marks, etc.) of one's own creation into Google Earth sessions, save them in jpeg format and share them with others. Google Earth uses KML, an XML-based language.The Map Collection Department of Yale University Libraries explore these tools to provide access to the map collection, creating dynamic "units" of information by digitizing print maps, data sets, etc. and creating data-layers

The first and last speaker of the day, William Rando, closed the workshop with an appropriate topic: Using Assessment to Enhance Instruction and Library Service. What, after all efforts are made, is the impact of using images in teaching? What difference does it really make?As part of the ELI project, an assessment model was developed and field-tested in a collaborative setting with faculty, teaching center staff and librarians (see: Danuta A. Nitecki and William Rando, ‘A library and teaching center collaboration to assess the impact of using digital images on teaching, learning, and library support’, in Vine, Vol. 34 (2004), No. 3, pp. 119-125.). The model consists of different rubrics and tries to map the intended learning outcomes, the way the teacher actually uses images in teaching and appropriate library services. The model is based on the principle that learning goals have to align with the way images are used in teaching and with the level of library services. For example, if images are used as "edutainment" and the students are expected to learn how to use visual resources in making a historical argument, there is a mismatch between methodology and learning outcomes. The approach particularly emphasizes the usefulness of assessment results for teachers.Conclusion After an exiting day, Danuta Nitecki closed the workshop by thanking speakers and audience, summarizing remarks and some questions to take home:

1. What challenges do we face to collecting, organizing, and describing visual resources?
2. Do new tools create a new kind of collection? If so, how do we preserve these ‘teaching objects’?
3. What is the impact on the role of the librarian and faculty with regards to supporting this kind of use and collections in the 21 st century.