Education Department Chair Mike Taber is excited to be presenting a research paper he co-authored with two education majors, Elizabeth Benedict and Elizabeth Waterman.

Dr. Taber will present “The Cognitive Development of Visual Literacy for Scientific Symbolic Problem Solving” at the New Perspectives in Science Education Conference in Florence, Italy in March, 2015.

The paper examines the extent to which novice scientists (i.e. students just learning science) are able to holistically interpret data. Where is the science learner’s level of visual literacy in terms of spatial thinking, recreating visual representations of information in visual format(s), and communication of complex patterns?

The preliminary study examined how well participants employed visual literacy skills in solving a symbolically driven problem.  Results showed that participants who possessed greater linguistic skills as well as spatial observation and reasoning skills were more likely to correctly identify all seven elements on the unknown cube face.

Elizabeth Benedict

Liz Waterman

Congratulations, Elizabeth and Liz!