Visual Literacy in Education

Okay, so I just watched this Martin Scorsese video on his views of visual literacy in education. He said a lot of interesting things in this clip. It's 11 minutes long, but well worth it, I think. He thinks that visual literacy - movies, television, photographs, etc. - should be taught in schools. I don't really know exactly how I feel about his claims. I suppose I'm leaning towards the opinion that it should be an option in the schools, maybe an exploratory class like music or art. Scorsese treats this as a medium to be taken seriously, and I agree with him on that. He talks about the power of images and that we should teach young people how to use and interpret this medium. The classes, he says, should be more than just watching movies for a few hours a week; they should encompass the history of film and force students to ask questions and to think differently.

I think these are great ideas, but my main concern is how to incorporate another class into the school day. Music, athletic, and foreign language programs are already being cut to provide more time for academics. How can we add something else that will take away from the basic academics?

How do I feel about this as it relates to my teaching? Well, lately people have been lumping film in with English classes (as if we don't have enough to do already). Even here at West GA there are film as literacy classes, and, if I'm not mistaken, they're thinking about making it a minor if they haven't already. I do agree that visual literacy is a field to be taken seriously and that it should be taught; my concern is simply that we don't have enough hours in the day. I think it would be possible to do a short unit on it and incorporate that into English classes. It could be fun for students to do something different, and it could provide great opportunities for writing and for seeing some literary terms in action since some of them do span the genres of film and literature. Again, though, it's a question of time. Ahhh. Around and around in circles we go....



Totally not related to this post.... There are a lot of pictures I'd like to put up here, just to make things a little more personal. I think I'll put up a new one with each post even if it isn't related to what I'm writing about. :) This time the picture is me and Matt. Sammi squeezed in it at the last minute - so cute! I'm really starting to like this blogging thing....