I recently ran into a friend of mine and she shared a personal experience she had this summer that emphasized the importance of using visual learning instructional techniques.

Kate is a high school social studies teacher and a champion of visual learning. In early July, she was at a birthday party for her two-year-old, twin granddaughters. Among the many gifts they received were plastic toy kitchens – one for each of them, of course. Kate set about putting one of the kitchens together and her husband, Alan, began to assemble the other one. Within a short period of time, Kate looked up and saw that Alan’s kitchen was fully assembled – while she continued to struggle to fit the pieces together on hers. She began to wonder why and then she looked at the directions again. They were completely verbal – no pictures. Normally when Kate can see “how” something is done, she can easily and quickly accomplish the task – but the words alone just didn’t help her. They didn’t communicate what she needed to know to accomplish the task. Kate is a visual learner!

Well, as their little granddaughters watched impatiently, Kate and Alan finally got both of the kitchens assembled and the little girls spent the rest of the party making plastic ice cream sundaes and toast for all of their guests. But, Kate said that the experience taught her a valuable lesson that she will take back to school with her this year. It reminded her how important it is to use a variety of different ways to communicate the same information to her students so that they all have the opportunity to learn and be successful. She wasn’t incapable of putting the kitchen together – she just needed the information communicated to her in a way she could understand.

And she has promised herself that she is going to integrate visual learning instructional strategies – and Inspiration and InspireData – into every aspect of her 10th grade social studies curriculum.

I know, like Kate, many of you have big plans for the new school year. I would love to hear what they are and how you will use visual learning with your students.