Importance of Visual Literacy in Photography Education

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What is Visual Literacy and Why is it important in Photography Education?
The incorporation of visual literacy teaching in curriculums shows that the education sector has started realizing the potential it has in shaping the competence of students Since images play a huge role in the social life of students it has seen a dramatic increase in educational resources as they are now geared to ensure students acquire visual literacy. In particular photography, education requires this skill therefore, children are starting to get introduced to visual literacy at an early age. In the study by Friedman, A Friedman, A, he exposes three-year-olds to educational mediation and the results show that such mediation by preschool teachers and parents play a huge role in developing their visual literacy. This is to equip them with the knowledge to analyze and deduct information from messages. For a long time, written and oral literacy has always taken precedence in teaching but with technology, visual literacy is starting to get recognized as a way of learning, if not the most efficient. Since visual literacy is important in information transmission, it makes sense that teachers want to utilize visual learning for the students to acquire knowledge. This essay is geared to show why visual literacy is needed and how we can cultivate it, especially in photography education. To achieve this, three research questions: what is visual literacy? what is the practical significance of visual literacy in photography education? and how to develop visual literacy in photography teaching discusses why visual literacy may as well change the education sector.
What is visual literacy
The surface meaning of visual literacy is self-explanatory. The meaning of visual in this context is an image or illustration. Literacy, on the other hand, is the ability to read and write. Therefore, visual literacy can be defined as an individual’s ability to visualize analyze and interpret and image to deduct the meaning of any information the image might be relaying. Visual literacy is based on the belief that information can be passed on through images and they can be read. CITATION Fra72 \l 1033 (Fransecky) Images showcase concepts that can be used to refer to a person or an object therefore, each individual interprets images through their perspective. These perspectives are influenced by beliefs and cultures that the individual associates with the person or object being represented by the image. Photography is an art and the images inform, reflect and communicate information about what is being captured. Technology has enabled us to effectively express our artistic interpretations of cultures, religion, beliefs, and vision of our surrounding environments. Therefore, visual literacy is influential in someone’s ability to recognize the intended message in a photographic image just the same way you can interpret something through reading a text.
Understanding an image, it requires observing the roles being played by the components of the image. Components of visual literacy such as body, object, abstract, sign and symbol languages provide guidelines on how one should approach studying an image. The meaning of a photo...