Consider different types of infographic models and how they can enhance student learning across educational domains, subjects and real-life applications. Can you apply one infographic to your final project proposal idea, to help define or explain it?

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When I first used Canva, an online-based graphics program available on the Internet, I ran into issues related to the functions available, i.e. which click buttons are available free-of-charge and which ones are enabled only upon the purchase of the software. After using the software free of charge for some time, I decided to purchase it by paying a monthly fee; only then was I able to use all of the functions and design my infographics to the fullest satisfaction.

Another problem was the website creation software called sites.google. It was because my infographic image got smaller when I inserted it after I downloaded it from Canva. I played with Canva’s image size buttons to resize my infographic to 800 X 1600, 1600 X 3000 and 2000 X 4000 and downloaded it and inserted it into my webpage on sites.google, but the infographic image still did not get bigger nor crisper the way I wanted to. This tells me that not only Canva but also sites.google may have its own limitations on how creatively we can manipulate our images.

Judging from my own experience with sites.google and Canva, I think I have one major concern for the integration of these applications into classroom activities. Some of these online products are good for all of their functions only when you purchase them for the full package. From my experience of teaching IT to Chinese students in China, I remember that students in the classroom kept coming back to me with questions about the functions they wanted to use but could not because those functions were disabled by the owners of the products. However, students are usually poor and cannot pay for the full service of the products. In China, many people used pirated programs and products, and my high school Chinese students worked around the problem by downloading the software without having to pay. However, it was always a hit-and-miss affair, so sometimes they were successful and other times, they could not download the software to take full advantage of all the functions of the graphics software.

Some software like Adobe Photoshop is very good and can produce high-quality graphics including infographics. However, software like that is a bit too sophisticated for teachers, let alone students, to understand. So I think teachers should be careful to introduce such software to their students. However, a well-trained IT teacher can teach it to the students with the timeline of a full semester; teachers can make students produce a good-quality image for their final assignment; even IT-challenged students can show their achievement of learning through a sophisticated software like that.

Canva is simpler to use and can be used in the classroom to teach the basics of how to manipulate images to deliver messages and enhance communication. However, as I said before, we should resolve the issue of paying for the full service if we really want to make our students enjoy the full benefits of the software.

Now, moving to PICRAT and how we can use Canva to teach CT (Creative Transformation) rather than PR (Passive Replacement), I would say this is absolutely possible when teachers can carefully model it for their students. I have recently viewed a Youtube video presented by Thug Notes. The teacher presented the novel Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky in ten minutes with a major storyline together with an analysis of the themes involved. When we allow students to view this Youtube video, we should be careful not to allow them to view it passively, because such passivity amounts to PR (Passive Replacement), which is not a desirable use of technology according to the technology integration model of PICRAT. Therefore, if I were to show the same video to my English/ESL students, I would ask them to read the English subtitle available at the bottom of the screen and transcribe them onto an infographics software like Canva. Then I would ask my students to re-assemble the text into some form of meaning. Of course, they can use graphic tools like circle, rectangle, line and arrow in order to enhance the meaning they are conveying. They would also have to know how to reduce the subtitle text into a simpler text and effectively communicate their understanding of the video with the bare minimum of text, because infographics will lose its effectiveness if we use too much text and too few graphics. (I initially used too much text for my About Me infographics and decided to cut it short to allow for more graphics. Sanaa, the TA, also suggested this idea!) Students will also have to know how to use templates effectively, because not all templates may not be good for the purpose of their work. Students will have to learn that graphics should be used for the purpose of aiding in communication but not for the sake of graphics.

I would argue that teachers should at first carefully model the infographics work and explain the details involved in the work before they start to ask students to do their project. As long as teachers model it for them carefully, I think the PICRAT technology integration model can work and we can move students from PR to CT. However, the bottom line is that everything depends on how closely we interact with our students in the classroom, how thoroughly we teach the process in a step-by-step manner, and how passionately we encourage our students to go through this challenging process and reach the destination of beaming in the joy of displaying their quality work to other peers and teachers and community members. In other words, going from PR to CT is doable by creating an infographic project with a Youtube video like Thug Notes and with an online software like Canva.