Extreme Presentation Makeover, Visual Literacy by Dr Lynell Burmark

Extreme Presentation Makeover (TCEA
2005)

Dr Lynell
Burmark

We read lowercase faster than
uppercase because our eye is able to naturally read it
faster

Charts and
Graphs

example of Dear John line
graph, who to blame pie graph

only
30% of people come close to keeping any of
their

If you do a “wipe up” with a
graph, that gets the point across
well

if you tell people a story, that
will be even better as far as getting the point
across
– you are more apt to remember the
picture rather than the graph

If I am
putting up a spreadsheet, your eyes glaze
over
– pictures are more
powerful

These are in her
book

When you see a word, make an
image in your head
– clipart is a pathetic
approximation of real life
– we are showing
you 3 levels of communicaton
– the word is
the most abstract: it leaves the most room for you going where you want to with
your brain

photos are more concrete,
so we are more apt to see the same thing
–
use the photograph or the real thing if you want kids to remember
it

VISUAL
LEARNERS
– how many here are visual
learners?
– many of us are predominantly
visual learners
– who can forget the image
of the planes hitting the twin
towers?

By age 18, most kids will
have watched 22,000 hours of TV
– will have
spent about 12,500 hours
– almost double
the time in front of the TV compared to in front of the
teacher

I didn’t think until I saw” –
that is how our brains work
– you can’t
conceive of something until you have imagined it (the word image is
there)
– need visuals to hook things
on

Book “Visual Literacy” by Lynell
Burmark
– Elevator story: the 13 seconds
you
– what you get is what you see is a
summary of her book

we process
visuals 60,000 times faster than text
–
because when we process text, we do it
sequentially
– when we process visuals,
they are simultaneous

Think of
difference of typing a description, versus snapping a
photo

Where do eyes go naturally in
an ad (example: Vioxx ad with teacher and
pinata)
– they know we are going to look at
the pinata / the color
– a little
manipulation going on there, we aren’t usually going to look at the
text

Every image that we see,
fortunately or unfortunately, is etched on our
brain
– they go DIRECTLY to long term
memory
– it is critcally important
what

don’t just go out and use more
images, go out and choose them
carefully

once we store the images in
long term memory, if you have hooked the information to an image, students can
recall it 42% better

information tied
to an image for TRANSFER, goes up 89% compared to text
only
– the implications of this research is
huge

use images to introduce a
concept like: which one doesn’t
work/fit

another reason for using
images: break down the classroom walls and take people to different
places

youth in america will have
witnessed 12,000 murders on network TV by age
14
– very important to use POSTIVE images
to try and counterbalance that
– by viewing
a Van Gough flower image, you boost your immune system for 6 hours (the
intention behind the
painting

positive images will boost
the immune system

I want to get a
grant to go out and find images, and scientifically test them (saliva shows your
immune system) to verify that these images will be the ones that boost your
immune system
– this is my dream, then give
the CD away to educators
– obviously images
of bloody bodies, etc have the opposite
effect

As educators we have a great
opportunity to bring in positive images
–
come up with postive images that give our students
HOPE
– they should leave our classrooms
more hopeful than they come in

Dr
burmark has a copy of this presentation on
DVD
– you can log on adn get one for
free
– also the cheapest place to get the
visual literacy book and DVD at
cost

The presenter should know their
start time!
– really important: should
stand to the left of the screen from the audience’s perspective (because in
English we read from left to right)
– then
the audience continually anchors their eye on you (the presenter) and then moves
from left to right

The audience does
not care what you say until they know how much you
care

I never talk about any topic on
which I am not passionate

how the
presenter dresses: thou shalt not
distract

Where does the eye go: we go
to color and image before we go to text
–
according to Xerox, customers will retain info 80% better if it is in
color
– Loyola study: time to locate target
word went up 74% with color
– RED is an
attention getting color

there is 1
color that draws the eye faster than red,
YELLOW
– the eye will go yellow before it
goes to red

painting by Monet: has
real sense of depth because yellow flowers come
forward
– yellow letters on blue background
are best: yellow comes forward, blue
recedes

When use black and
white?
– used to be cheaper to print black
and white: there are very few reasons to do
so
– photos taken during the civil
war

HUMOR

Victor
Borga: the shortest distance between two people is
laughter
you can’t laugh and snore at the
same time
ahajokes.com is a site with clean
humor

www.go2bed.com

Putting
together presentations that have graphics take a lot of
time
– have your students learn some of the
expertise, let your students do a lot of the
work
– use photoshop sometimes to modify:
filter – noise – despecle

Is a
measuring tool behind the eyedropper
– can
draw a line on something and PhotoShop will autorotate, doing the
calculations

Add text in PowerPoint
because you can edit it

use images
purposefully
– use clip from Cosby show,
talking about Bill remembering the song that was playing on the car radio when
he proposed

NetTrekker allows you to
search the web with approved site

use
tceaburmark as userid/pw on netrekker
websites
– you can send kids there without
worrying
– great way to incorporate the
images
– use filtering for pictures
only

take blue sheet to netrekker
booth to win a 4 megapixel camera, booth
1428

Using more
music
– Antarctic Antics: A book of Penguin
Forms
– a video that includes the wonderful
clip she showed at the end of the
presentation

be my penguin courtesy
of westin woods

CD “Enlighten Up!”
produced at 60 beats per minute, stress-lightening music for the
classroom