Teaching Information Visualization - Information Visualization: Human-Centered Issues and Perspectives - page 84

- Map design [7]
- Use of colour [22]
- Interactivity and functionality [11, 41]
- Animation [21, 55]
Each of these sources provides useful criteria to structure critiques and against
which judgments can be made. Amar and Stasko's framework [2] also offers
opportunities and Dagstuhl has drawn attention to the scope for using more
knowledge from InfoVis in developing critiquing criteria.
Paper Summaries. Presenting summaries of research papers is clearly a core
activity in InfoVis teaching and learning. This fits the critiquing trend if the
work is evaluative and assessed against existing theory and criteria. Tamara
Munzner's generic 'what makes a good InfoVis paper' criteria as presented and
discussed at the Dagstuhl seminar [52] could prove useful in this kind of learning
activity.
The validity of critiquing depends upon the level of learning being supported.
In the UK some of the more advanced levels of knowledge, such as those devel-
oped through critiquing, relate to the more advanced levels of learning. Masters
level and level-3 courses require students to evaluate and so the approach is
particularly appropriate. It can be used to provide feedback and for assessment.
I've found that extended abstracts work well as a focus for quick and informal
'in class' critiquing that breaks up a learning session.
Learning by Doing:
“I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand”
(Chinese proverb).
Participants in an Information Visualization seminar are likely to be persuaded
that seeing is a powerful learning device. But 'learning by doing' may be even
more effective. It is a form of active learning that is popular in education and
there is particular opportunity for using this approach in visualization education.
Doing can involve summarizing information, developing graphics or software or
analyzing data sets and the Dagstuhl participants provide plenty of examples of
these activities in their courses as we have seen in this paper.
Fieldwork is used to provide opportunities for learning by doing in the geo-
sciences and has an important role in education [31]. There are parallels between
the kind of observation, interaction and exploration that occur in fieldwork and
those associated with the kind of exploratory analysis that visualization sup-
ports. I have explored some of these parallels and opportunities when developing
learner-focused activities that emphasize learning by doing. The constructivist
approach emphasizes learning through an interpretive, non-linear and recursive
process in which active learners interact with their surroundings and the re-
sources that are provided to help [19]. Such methods are regularly used in geo-
science fieldwork and may result in 'deep understanding' of the kind experienced