This resource is a modification of the Washington Models for the Evaluation of Bias Content in Instructional Materials (2009) that is made available through OER Commons under a public domain license. This resource attempts to both update the content with more contemporary vocabulary and also to narrow the scope to evaluating still images as they are found online. It was developed as a secondary project while working on a BranchED OER grant during summer 2020. It includes an attached rubric adapted from the Washington Model (2009).

"The Civil War in Art: Teaching and Learning through Chicago Collections" is intended to help teachers and students learn about the Civil War—its causes and effects—and connect to the issues, events, and people of the era through works of art.

Web resource explores the Civil War through over 120 zoomable images from Chicago collections, with text and questions for students. The site presents essays about: The Civil War and American visual culture, the causes of the war, the military experience, emancipation and the meaning of freedom, the northern homefront, Lincoln, and remembering the war.

Other resources include classroom projects for teacher use, an in-depth glossary of art and historical terms, and links to additional Civil War resources.

Ekphrastic poetry is inpired by art. This lesson includes a teacher plan and slides to engage students in exploring and writing this type of poetry. With a link to the Washington Superintendent's High School Art Show, students can view the creativity of other teenagers to write their poems.

How to Canva: Tips and Tricks is an online introductory course on Canva. It is designed as open educational resources for educators and all. In this course, you will learn how to customise text, text effects, colours, photos, videos and elements plus pro tips and Ideas for Creative uses of Elements, Keywords and Styles. The videos are concise, purposeful and delivered in easy-to-follow lessons that progressively build one's skills over time. By the end of this course, you will be able to create an attractive Instagram post. Click on View Resource and let's get started!

This is an 8 week experience for the college student that begins by setting a learning context through using library resources, especially online databases, for locating images and art that reflect a chosen research topic and creating a mural that demonstrates the students’ comprehension of the chosen topic. The experience includes conducting research on 3 significant events or people in women’s US history. The written research will be accompanied by images or art that the student has chosen (described) as reflective of, or related to the researched event or person. In order to determine the students’ level of information literacy, the research will include a detailed description of how the students located the images. The students will also draw or describe a personalized sketch of one of the researched events or people. The culmination of the research is the design and painting of a collaborative mural depicting the students' research topics.

This Reusable Learning Object (RLO) was created out of the desire to infuse university courses with information literacy or research activities. A traditional research project on significant events or people in history is enhanced with the discovery and analyzing of art and images within the context of history. Analysis not only includes written text but the painting of a mural. The RLO is structured in a way that allows for easy replication and alteration to a variety of subjects and learning levels.

This social media literacy unit introduces students to foundational skills in analyzing images and social media posts. It also reenforces critical thinking questions that can be applied to various forms of media. This unit was taught to 9th grade students but is easily adaptible to a range of secondary classrooms. It was also taught in conjunction with another unit focused on social media platforms and content.

This social media literacy unit introduces students to foundational skills in analyzing images and social media posts. It also reenforces critical thinking questions that can be applied to various forms of media. This unit was taught to 9th grade students but is easily adaptible to a range of secondary classrooms. It was also taught in conjunction with another unit focused on social media platforms and content.

This social media literacy unit introduces students to foundational skills in analyzing images and social media posts. It also reenforces critical thinking questions that can be applied to various forms of media. This unit was taught to 9th grade students but is easily adaptible to a range of secondary classrooms. It was also taught in conjunction with another unit focused on social media platforms and content.

Welcome to Essential Reading. This course has been designed to enable you to focus your learning on specific areas of improvement. Unlike a typical college course where you would complete lessons in chronological order, this course allows you to focus on just specific skills. Modules Include: Recognition and Decoding, Vocabulary, and Functional and Informational Texts

This article describes how elementary teachers can use modified writer's workshops to help students organize information in their science notebooks.

This module was created in response to an observed need by BranchED and the module authors for efforts to increase the recognition, adaptation, and use of open educational resources (OER) among pre- and in-service teachers and the faculty who work in educator preparation programs. The module's purpose is to position teacher educators, teacher candidates and in-service teachers as empowered content creators. By explicitly teaching educators about content that has been licensed for re-use and informing them about their range of options for making their own works available to others, they will gain agency and can make inclusive and equity-minded decisions about curriculum content. The module provides instructional materials, resources, and activities about copyright, fair use, public domain, OER, and visual literacy to provide users with a framework for selecting, modifying, and developing curriculum materials.

From "The Spectrum of Apple Flavors" to "We are all Zebras: How Rare Disease is Shaping the Future of Healthcare," we find colorful visual displays of information and data used to persuade, inform and delight their audience-readers. Most infographic assignments result in loose collections of related facts and numbers, essentially a collage or poster. Student create displays of unrelated factoids and spurious data correlations and they "ooh" and "ahhh" at beautiful nothings. However, the visual and textual elements of an infographic can culminate in a coherent multimodal argument which prompts inquiry in the creator and the audience.  In order to teach infographics as a claim expressed through visual metaphor, supported by reasoning with evidence in multiple modes, instructors employ a sequence of interventions to invoke the relevant skills and strategies at appropriate moments.  Composing and critiquing infographics can enhance understanding of both the content and rhetoric, since people analyze, elaborate and critique information more deeply when visual and textal modes are combined (Lazard and Atkinson 2014).This pedagogy of reading and writing multiple literacies can be adapted to other multimodal products. For an overview, refer to "Recipe for an Infographic" (Abilock and Williams 2014) which is also listed in the references for this module. We recommend that you experience this process yourself as you teach it to students.   

From "The Spectrum of Apple Flavors" to "We are all Zebras: How Rare Disease is Shaping the Future of Healthcare," we find colorful visual displays of infGrotewold, K. (2020, August). Framework for analysis of visual information. In Assessing Visual Materials for Diversity & Inclusivity. https://www.oercommons.org/courseware/lesson/69336/. Licensed as CC BY-NC-SA   

Introduces the ethical dimension of finding, using, and sharing images in the context of the undergraduate research assignment. Students will understand the ethical aspects of finding, using, and sharing images; will engage with copyright issues and concepts of intellectual property; and will find and analyze specific images as examples.

The Visual Storytelling lesson plan is a series of four learning ladder activities designed around mobile/digital technology for use by intermediate art and design students. It is a framework for concept ideation, visual design planning, and production. Activity 1: Story Slides is a foundational activity for developing narrative visual storytelling skills. It can be used as an icebreaker for introductions as well as provide the instructor with an authentic assessment of current student visual design skills. 

The Visual Storytelling lesson plan is a series of four learning ladder activities designed around mobile/digital technology for use by intermediate art and design students. It is a framework for concept ideation, visual design planning, and production. Activity 2: Concept Mapping is a foundational activity for developing narrative visual storytelling skills. Mapping is utilized to exampine concepts for story development and visual design. 

The Visual Storytelling lesson plan is a series of four learning ladder activities designed around mobile/digital technology for use by intermediate art and design students. It is a framework for concept ideation, visual design planning, and production. Activity 3: Subtext Storyboard is a versitle tool students can use to develop including both abstract concepts and narrative structure. 

The Visual Storytelling lesson plan is a series of four learning ladder activities designed around mobile/digital technology for use by intermediate art and design students. It is a framework for concept ideation, visual design planning, and production. Activity 4: Design Matrix introduces students to production planning for multiple types of media.