Using Web Based Technology to Breathe Life into Science Lessons with Visual Arts

I found that most of my students had a difficult time looking at a picture or diagram of a science concept in a textbook and understanding what the image is depicting. This is especially important in science, because many science concepts are learned as cycles or circles.

Pictures in science textbooks do not address multiple learning styles of students; they are designed primarily for visual/spatial learners.

I found it was easier to address more learning styles through the use of visual arts to teach science. I primarily used three dimensional animations or interactive animations of science concepts.

These animations are readily available on the Web to help provide a visual art representation of a specific science concept.

My students would use web based resources to view during lectures, discussions, investigations, mysteries, and case studies.

These three dimensional visual art representations helped my students develop a better idea of what is actually happening in a cycle, as opposed to viewing pictures which require spatial learning ability.

Sometimes these visual arts representations do not need to be in actual three dimensions, they only need to convey a three dimensional aspect.

One example of Carbon Cycle animation.

Additional ideas for using visual arts in science can be found at Using Visual Arts to Stimulate Science Learning.