Photo manipulation; source: Wallpapervortex, accessed on 22 March 2013
The use of images in teaching and learning carries a number of benefits to support student comprehension, retention and application. Various research on visual literacy in education indicates that the importance of images lies in the overall improvement of student performance in class, as "it encourages thoughtful analysis of the underlying meaning"(here).
On the other hand, Sherry (1996) warns that inappropriate use of images in a school setting may lead to the opposite effect, where students instead of focusing on the topic, see only the "exciting or entertaining aspects of a presentation". Therefore, visual elements may certainly enhance our teaching and students' learning experience but with their right application.
The basic skills in the area of image manipulation can enrich teacher's presentation. For instance, teachers must be able to adjust the size of chosen images to complement, not overwhelm or distract, the oral or written material. Bulky size photos take longer to upload online, which decreases the level of professionalism while presenting in front of students (imagine this awkward moment when none of your images uploaded online comes up properly on the screen just because you forgot to change their dimensions).
There are plenty of resizing online tools, such as Picresize, Shrinkpictures or Webresizer. Some of us may prefer to download their "resizers" - Mobaphoto is just one out of many. I personally choose the "easy" way and use either Preview or iPhoto embedded on my Mac. The full instructions on how to use these resizing methods are available here (only for Mac users!). To enhance, emphasise or add fun factor to the images, the following websites are particularly helpful: BeFunky, Pixlr, Cartoon Photo and Dumpr.
Below, I am presenting the results of my resizing/picture manipulating/uploading work contrasted with original images. Shakespeare and Ophelia are my beautiful puppy dogs :)
Original image: BeFunky: image manipulation - Cross Process 1, filmstrip:
Original image: Cartoon Photo: cartoon, stylish golden frame:
Reduced size (iPhoto) photo of Ophelia and Shakespeare in our backyard:
I really enjoyed reading this post. Your example about images not being uploaded correctly and not working when the teacher wanted to present them is one that happened to my teacher in high school. I remember it not working about half way through his powerpoint presentation and him scurrying to figure it out. Meanwhile the whole class seized the opportunity and started talking and moving around the room. It took the teacher about 10 minutes to sort out the program and then another 5 to bring the class back to a working level. I suppose this hightlights the fact that we need to always have a backup of the images we use, even if it's just handing around a piece of paper with the image printed on it. What other backups would you suggest?
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