An Investigation into Visual Learning in the Contemporary Primary Classroom

Visual learning is central to the holistic education of all young students in our image saturated,

ocular-centric, culture. Visual knowing is a key sensory knowing. It is both embodied and enactive, born from the observation of our environment and the tangible manipulation of materials and technologies. The creation of objects and artefacts is the learning thread that ties students back to their humanness as making, creating and communicating are primal human traits. Little research exists regarding the visual learning spaces operating in the current neoliberal, vocational and assessment driven educational context of the primary classroom. In particular, what is the nature of teacher pedagogies, specifically the teaching practices of experienced Australian primary teachers? The purpose of this qualitative inquiry was to uncover what is really happening in classrooms regarding the understanding and use of visual learning pedagogies. For the first time, in depth conversational, one on one interviews, involving 15 experienced practising teachers were ethically gathered across a 12 month period. The authentic voices (n=15) of these experienced teachers were examined to reveal the nature of their visual praxis inside New South Wales Public schools in Australia. The inquiry took a constructivist approach and applied two theoretical lenses, Vygotsky’s theory of sociocultural constructivism and Habermas’ communicative way of knowing. Beginning from the position of researcher/teacher practitioner and involving a series of iterative methodological shifts, it emerged as a researcher/teacher practitioner/participant inquiry. The focus was one of reflexive inquiry of both the interview data gathered in the field or school environment-classrooms and the insights of the researcher/teacher practitioner/participant. It was interrogated to reveal what the teacher knowledge of visual learning, its related concepts and visual learning practices looked like. The researcher/teacher practitioner research design initially drew from the Delphi and World Café models, with the researcher as observer. The move to a more iterative, reflexive research design with the researcher/teacher, now a participant, offered the ability to adapt and evolve in response to emergent new information at each phase of the research design. It also came with greater insider trust, more flexibility and more fluid and responsive opportunities to gather the insights about visual learning as teacher reflective moments. These conversations were best able to reveal how Visual Arts, visual literacy and visual cognition, the three key components of a visual learning pedagogy, are being employed in the teachers’ contemporary classrooms. The visual learning praxis, and the artful cognition it promotes, was considered within the context of the teacher classrooms and the research key questions “What does visual learning look like in the primary classroom?”, “How is Visual Arts learning in the primary classroom championed?” and “What is the potential of visual learning in the primary classroom?”. Data was analysed within the current neoliberal economy driven education system, driven by policy makers and the proliferation of contentious evidence-based approaches. The inquiry sought to unpack the tensions that might appear between visual learning praxis, and the artful cognition it promotes. The neuroscientific evidence clearly demonstrates the cognitive power of making through visual learning works, and how it works hand in hand with embodied learning opportunities promoted by the Creative and Performing Arts and visual learning. The findings stem directly from the voices of teachers and reveal that there are indeed tensions for the teachers. Beyond the policy and structural imperatives of evidence-driven pedagogies the opportunities for visual learning were compounded by teacher inadequacies in the Visual Arts space as well as the importance placed on curriculum areas that are assessed through rigorous standardised testing procedures. Visual Arts learning remained on the curriculum periphery. Teachers’ innate awareness of the transformational power of the visual was clear, however, they also demonstrated frustration as their creativity is bound and limited by a policy driven one- size-fits-all pedagogy currently promoted as the signature pedagogy by policy makers. Teachers were challenged when attempting to promote these forms of learner engagement. In addition, Visual Arts and its place in the curriculum sitting alongside shifts in school education policy has future implications for both the delivery of initial teacher education and teacher Professional Learning. The implications of this inquiry are significant as the state of Visual Arts and visual learning are neglected in initial teacher education and teacher Professional Learning. Teachers demonstrate clear and ongoing misunderstandings around visual learning which ultimately impacts student learning. The Visual Arts learning space remains dire in primary school classrooms. This inquiry recommends empowering teachers through quality face-to face and online Professional Learning. It recommends that governing bodies support and promote Visual Arts and visual pedagogies through a quality syllabus that includes the rigorous and future focused artful cognition promoted through Visual Arts.