My Concept about Life has a New Dimension


The multimedia concept is based on a common denominator in the field of computers: items can be brought together from the field of videography, audiography, scriptography, and synthesis image which, after abandoning their atomic structure to be converted into the smallest computer unit of image synthesis - the bit    – are reorganized into a new entity incorporating characteristics of its initial components but progressively tending to assert itself as a medium with its own personality and specific characteristics.

As educators, we owe a lot to Richard Mayer for applying the science of learning to education, with current projects on multimedia learning, computer-supported learning, and computer games for learning. His research is at the intersection of cognition, instruction, and technology, with a focus on how to help people learn in ways so they can transfer what they have learned to new situations. After my literature review and reading multiple documents and papers on the topic of multimedia, I have a new understanding of the concepts. According to Dr. Mayer, the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning (CTML) is based on three assumptions:

Dual Coding Theory. The first assumption is the unproven but somewhat accepted theory that we process visual and verbal information differently and in two separate channels. Known as Paivio’s (1991) Dual Coding Theory, it states that we process and internally represent visual information in a different way than verbal communication.

Limited Capacity. The second assumption is that due to the capacity of working memory, we can only process a limited amount of information on each channel at one time.

Active Processing. The final assumption is that to make something meaningful; people actively process information by paying attention and organizing and integrating the data.

The implications of this theory would definitely help me design better eLearning courses.  In many ways, it brings me back to the basics of good instructional design.

•          If the learner is processing a limited portion of a multimedia message due to the limited capacity of working memory, then be sure you have the learner’s full attention.

•          If the learner is selecting a limited portion of the audio and visual message, be sure to emphasize and concentrate on what is most important.

•          If the learner is organizing and structuring knowledge to build a coherent model, then present the multimedia message in a transferable structure (for example, comparing the characteristics of two concepts is a comparison structure that can help build accurate mental models).

•          If the learner must integrate a verbal model and a pictorial model, then ensure the multimedia elements are well-synchronized to promote integration.

 

Putting this together, one can assume that instructional designers must take care to integrate text, graphics, and narration in order to help the learner learn the way humans learn. But, there can be differences between the subject matter being taught in the effectiveness of different forms of multimedia. While the Ögren, etal (2017) study showed students who are first presented with graphs in learning mathematics would typically focus on the map rather than the instructions to a problem, Clark and Mayer (2016) could be interpreted that integrating instructions with the graphs could improve the performance in learning complex mathematics.

The perspective based on which it is intended to define and stabilize multimedia incorporates new procedures and their insertion into new communications’ strategies, namely in two situations which had been missing thus far from the theory and practice everyday to traditional media: the interface and interactivity, which lend a media angle to the relationship which man establishes with a given multimedia application off or online.

Computer technologies form the basis for sustaining the process whereby multimedia applications are created. The growing capacity of processing alongside the flexibility and ergonomy of those tools which allow the construction of products integrating good quality video, three-dimensional images, sound and texts, have afforded the creation of applications in all fields of knowledge. Knowing how to devise multimedia products is a vital aspect when carrying out an in-depth analysis of communications’ models and strategies which have arisen out of the new information society. The pre-requisite for working in the multimedia area derive– at a personal level– from a range of experiences in television, journalism, cinema and radio. However, the sine qua non condition for a broad range of know-how to bear multimedia fruit, is the basic recycling of mental models and working procedures. The younger generation can acquire skills in this field from an early age; skills which they will have to complement with knowledge of those media which preceded this communications’ model at a later stage.

 

References

Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R. E. (2016). E-Learning and the science of instruction: proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning. (4th ed.). Hoboken, NJ.: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

 

Clark, J. M. & Paivio, A. (1991). Dual coding theory and education. Educational Psychology Review, 3(3), 149-170.

Mayer, R. E. (2019).  Computer games in education.  Annual Review of Psychology, 70, 531-549.

Mayer, R. E., Wells, A., Parong, J., & Howarth, J. (2019).  Learner control of the pacing of an online slideshow: Does segmenting help?  Applied Cognitive Psychology, 33, 930-935.

Ögren, M., Nyström, M., & Jarodzka, H. (2017). There’s more to the multimedia effect than meets the eye: is seeing pictures believing? Instructional Science45(2), 263– 287   



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