Visual culture

"The group of nearly 60 million individuals born after 1979, represents the largest generation of young people in the nation's history, and the first to grow up in a world saturated with networks of information, digital devices, and the promise of perpetual connectivity."
- Youth as E-citizens. Kathryn Montgomery. et al. (2004)



We live in a visual culture. Even more, we live in a rapidly changing, flashing, digital multimedia world. The young people of today grow up in a zap culture: a world full of choices, but also one in which they are strongly encouraged to search for themselves. Before, when you read an interesting book, that book guided you form the beginning to the end. If you read an article in the internet, you click on a link, another link and another link, which requires different assimilation and filtering skills.

The flow of information in the internet seems to be never-ending. The young people of today are used to dealing with this abundant information. But they still have to learn to separate the wheat from the chaff.

All of this creates expectations for our education system. Young people want to see the same visually appealing way of working in their classroom. On the internet, video, animation, images, sound and 3D elements can be found... Gradually, these media are being introduced to the classroom.

Teachers, however, are faced with the big challenge to follow and be savvy about all the technological changes. A good platform for teachers, good support and creating easily digestible learning packages and more diverse lesson plans, are absolutely essential. Innovative teachers should be encouraged to introduce and present good sources, and the others to make use of them.

Source: New World of Learning (VANERUM Group).