Visual Intelligence: Using the Deep Patterns of Visual Language to Build Cognitive Skills

I have a cogent argument for the power of interactive visualizing as a way to build cognitive capability in the recent issue of Theory into Practice, a journal for educators from Ohio State University. It’s a special Issue – Volume 47, Issue 2, called Digital Literacies in the Age of Sight and Sound. It was guest edited by Susan Metros, University of Southern California, and Kristina Woolsey, my friend and colleague from the New Media Thinking Project (and former head of Apple’s SF multimedia center and its Advance Technology Labs).

My chapter outlines how, when one thinks about drawing and visualizing as a process rather than an artifact, that the underlying grammar and structure of the visualization archetypes become clear.

We are arranging for distribution of the chapter, but in the meantime you can get it by ordering the Journal with this Theory into Practice flier .

Download TIPFlier.pdf (160.3K)

Here is what the editors have to say about the issue: “Education prepares learners to be stewards of knowledge. Central to this mission is a set of core values that support what it means to be a literate human being. However, currently these values often do not take into account the needs of the new breed of learners or the existence of new forms of global communications. Whether through image-saturated television, movies, video games, Internet sites, or the news media, young adults currently navigate within a world rich with sight and sound.

Screentime—with its nonlinear clickability and elements of image, color, sequence, sound, and motion—has been added to the once privileged paper space as a primary organizing format for expressing and exchanging knowledge. Yet most educators consider the foundation of literacy to be the ability to read and write. Few broaden the definition to include the ability to decipher, interpret, express, and effectively communicate ideas with sights and sounds.

This issue explores ways that educators might employ new digital literacies to prepare learners for academic success, professional advancement and, ultimately, global citizenship. Authors describe how educators prepare students to face the growing glut of written, auditory and visual data, information, and knowledge; define core values that promote visual and auditory acuity alongside the ability to read and write; formalize curricula that engage and challenge students, and initiate debate on ethical issues about how new media both manipulates and benefits society.