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During a classroom-based study that featured wordless and almost wordless picturebooks, instruction and adult mediation communicated to Kindergarten children that elements of visual art, design, and layout are fundamental to meaning-making when transacting with this format of literature. The illustration techniques described by Ray (2010) were used as an analytical lens to analyze the transcripts from the small group interactive sessions of an almost wordless picturebook featured during the research. The descriptive analyses of the transcripts reveal the rich viewing and talking opportunities that can be afforded during children's transactions with almost wordless picturebooks when these selections of literature are situated as aesthetic objects, and when children and adult mediators understand and appreciate how meaning is individually and synergistically represented by elements of visual art, design and layout. The findings are discussed in relation to the literature reviewed, and the theoretical frameworks of social semiotics and sociocultural theory.

The design of textbooks used in teaching and learning processes is of great importance to each level of education from pre-primary through to higher education. Textbooks, especially at primary level, include lots of visual images. It is, therefore, of crucial importance to resort to effective and proper ways of using visual design elements in textbooks. This study was to examine Grade Three Primary Mathematics and Turkish Textbooks published by Republic of Türkiye Ministry of National Education Publishing in 2018-2019 Academic Year in Türkiye in terms of visual-text design and typography. The data draws on the evaluation of content design of textbooks respecting typographic style, visual design principles and suitability of visual images. This study, based on qualitative research model, is a multi-case study for which the data were collected through semi-structured interviews. Following the evaluation of the field experts, there was a total of 18 open-ended questions. We recruited eleven field experts to collect qualitative data through semistructured interviews. During the interviews, the participants provided data on typographic style, visual design principles and suitability of visual images. Based on the content analysis results, we found that there are some typographic errors in the content design of textbooks. Further, no original visual images seemed to be included in the textbooks examined. We can conclude that the related textbooks do not comply with the Gestalt Principle of Continuity. Other visual design elements such as the use of visual hierarchy, two-pages spread design, and the emphasis effect and alike are not satisfied since there is no consistency in the drawings of the content design of textbooks. We argue that it is of vital importance to recruit professional textbook designers in the design process of textbooks and to pay more attention to the visual evaluation criteria prepared by the relevant Board of Education.

Metamemory judgments, defined as predictions of memory performance, are often influenced by misleading cues, such as fluency. However, how fluency cues compete to influence retrospective metamemory judgments is still unclear. The present study investigated how multiple fluency cues concurrently influence immediate feeling of knowing (FOK) judgments with two fluency manipulations--font size (large vs. small font size) as a perceptual cue and level of processing (deep vs. shallow processing) as a conceptual cue. In Experiment 1, participants studied large or small unrelated word pairs and were either directed to process the conceptual aspects of each word pair (deep) or to focus on the perceptual aspects of the word pairs (shallow). Then participants were presented with a cued recall test and asked to make an FOK judgment. Lastly, participants received a five alternative- forced-choice recognition test. Experiment 2 was similar except the deep condition was replaced with a no-processing (no instruction) condition. Results revealed that perceptual fluency (large font size) influenced FOK judgments only when word pairs were processed in the shallow condition in both experiments compared to no-processing condition. This interaction of multiple cues suggests that, participants rely on information which is easily accessible to them (perceptual fluency) for FOK judgements in presence of certain secondary cues despite those cues being less diagnostic of future memory performance. These new insights inform how people integrate different sources of information in metamemory decisions and have broad implications for settings including academic learning and everyday decision making.

Education in Malaysia is transforming to increase students' ability and meet the needs of the industry. In Design and Technology subject, students apply the technology to develop a product capable of solving problems through a project-based learning approach. Therefore, this study aims to (a) identify problems in the implementation of design project and (b) identify the needs for module development. An online survey was conducted on 140 Design and Technology subject teachers in Batu Pahat district, Johor. Findings showed that the overall level of problem in the implementation of project-based learning was high and there was no significant difference in perception of problems in implementing project-based learning by gender, but a significant difference of perception by teaching experience. In terms of module content, the overall findings showed that the content requirement in the module was high. Gender and teaching experience showed no significant difference in perception of module content requirement. Finally, the findings showed that the suggested module design features are using Arial font and multi-colour, content in point form, A4 size, and contain graphical content. Therefore, it is proposed that this module should be developed due to its high requirements and should meet the needs of users, so that the goals of project implementation can be achieved.

A common method used by memory scholars to enhance retention is to make materials more challenging to learn--a benefit termed desirable difficulties. Recently, researchers have investigated the efficacy of Sans Forgetica, a perceptually disfluent/distinctive font which may increase processing effort required at study and enhance memory as a result. We examined the effects of Sans Forgetica relative to a standard control font (Arial) on both correct memory and associative memory errors using the Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM) false memory paradigm, to evaluate Sans Forgetica effects on overall memory accuracy. Across four experiments, which included nearly 300 participants, Sans Forgetica was found to have no impact on correct or false memory of DRM lists relative to a standard Arial control font, regardless of whether font type was manipulated within or between subjects or whether memory was assessed via free recall or recognition testing. Our results indicate that Sans Forgetica is ineffective for improving memory accuracy even when accounting for associative memory errors.

Touted as a solution, dyslexia fonts have been growing in popularity during this era of increased political and state-wide attention to the reading and learning needs of students with dyslexia. This paper reviews the research literature on effectiveness of dyslexia fonts and offers evidence-based instructional recommendations for students with dyslexia.

The general aim of this research is to try to determine the appropriateness of the visuals in the primary school Turkish workbooks for the students with low visibility in terms of visual design elements. In the realization of the work, the document review method was used. In this study, purposive sampling method was used in the selection of student workbooks. The Ministry of National Education Publications Student Workbook which has been studied in the provinces of Ankara city is determined as the document to be examined. Within the scope of the research 1. 2. 3. and 4. Class Turkish lesson, a random theme was determined among the themes in the Student Workbooks and the activities included in that theme were examined. The "Visual Design Principles Evaluation Form" has been prepared so that the necessary data can be collected after the document review for the research is decided. Within the scope of the research, color use, contrast use, font, layout use, and visual complexity are not appropriate for the low vision students. This situation gives the impression that the visual limitations, the low vision students have difficulty in, are not taken into consideration while preparing the visual activities in the Turkish textbooks. It can be said that the elementary school students who see this way out of the way are disadvantaged compared to their peers who have the normal sight power and use the same text book.

Objective: To evaluate the health education infographics posted on Twitter accounts by major health care institutions in Saudi Arabia. Method: Cross-sectional review of health education infographics using a semi-structured evaluation form. The scoring rubric included 10 criteria grouped under 4 main headings: (1) usefulness, (2) legibility, (3) graphics and illustrations and (4) aesthetics. Rated on a scale of 1 to 5, scored items were summed and converted into a percentage. Each infographic was classified as being of high quality (70%-100%), medium quality (40%-69%) or low quality (0%-39%). Results: A total of 297 infographics were evaluated. The most common topics concerned chronic diseases and associated risk factors (n = 72) and healthy lifestyle (n = 51). The highest re-tweets (524), likes (605) and replies (226) were received by government organisations. Overall, 249 (83.8%) infographics were categorised as of 'high quality', 46 (15.5%) as 'medium quality', and 2 (0.7%) as 'low quality'. The highest proportion (93%) of 'high-quality' infographics came from government hospitals. Among individual criterion, drawings (17.2%) made up the highest proportion of the 'low quality' category followed by overall design (10.8%) and purpose (10.8%). Light text (covering < 50% of the infographic) showed a significant statistical association with the number of replies (p = 0.007), number of likes (p = 0.003) and number of retweets (p = 0.018). Conclusion: The majority of infographics were rated as being of 'high quality'. Government institutions were assessed as having better quality infographics than private hospitals. We recommend that social media design specialists and health education specialists collaborate to design clear infographics with better overall design.

Purpose: This paper aims to present three girls' visual annotations and digital responses that restory a scene in the picturebook I'm New Here. The authors focus on how children use multimodal tools to reflect their critical knowledge of the world by illuminating how this group of girls responded to and incorporated broader social issues. Design/methodology/approach: This study takes place in a third-grade classroom. Using qualitative methods that build on critical multimodal literacy, the authors documented and analyzed children's visual and digital interpretations. Data were generated from classroom sessions that incorporated interactive readalouds, as well as students' annotated visual images, sketches, video and digital responses. The collaborative analytic process involved multiple passes to interpret visual, textual and multimodal elements. Findings: The analyses revealed how Aliyah, Tiana and Carissa used multimodal tools to engage in the process of restorying. Through their multimodal composition, they designed images that illuminated their solidarity with the young female character wearing the hijab; their desire to disrupt xenophobic bullying; and their hope for a respectful and inclusive climate in their own classroom. Originality/value: In this paper, the authors examine how three girls in a third-grade classroom restory using critical multimodal literacy methods. These girls' multimodal responses reflected how they disrupted dominant storylines of exclusionary practices. Their authentic acts of visual advocacy give us hope for the future.

With increasing changes in our demographic populations and new immigrants settling in the US, there is an increasing need for visual communications that address the diversity of our populations. This paper draws from the results of the researcher's several past research and teaching projects that worked with different cultural populations. These projects examined the theme of multicultural design with a particular focus on user experience for audiences from different cultural backgrounds. The nature of the projects included printed materials, web design, video production, and interactive design. The researcher examined users' preferences for precise language presentation, options of visual layout, cultural related design elements such as images, colors, fonts, and interactive interface design. The goal of this paper is to increase design educators' and students' awareness in designing projects for culturally diverse audiences.

Over the last years, several studies have suggested a possible link between dyslexia and deficits in low-level visual processing (e.g., excessive crowding). At the same time, specially designed "dyslexia-friendly" fonts appeared on the market. This class of fonts presents two main features: the particular graphic characteristics of the letterform designed to avoid confusion between similarly shaped letters, and wider inter-letter and inter-word spacing to limit crowding. The literature testing the efficacy of "dyslexia-friendly" fonts in improving reading accuracy and increasing reading speed is controversial. We evaluated the impact of letterform (with vs. without dyslexia-friendly graphic features), inter-letter spacing (standard vs. increased), and inter-word spacing (standard vs. increased) on reading accuracy and speed. Two groups of 64 children each, with and without dyslexia, read aloud 8 equivalent texts. The data collected failed to show any effect from the letterform. As regards spacing, the data showed that reading speed is impaired by an increase in inter-letter spacing not combined with an adequate increase in inter-word spacing.

Texts are a group of letters which are printed or displayed in a particular style and size. In the course of the fast speed of technological development everywhere and expanding use of computer based instruction such as online courses, students spend more time on a computer screen than printed media. Texts have been the main element to convey messages. It has also been a significant component for learning. The main goal of this research is to measure the effects of font type and spacing of on screen text and its readability in improving and boosting the learner's ability to read easily, recall information, and enhance their reading speed and comprehension from on screen text with different topics. The readability of text on screens is necessary to ensure effective engagement in order to enhance the level of students' readability. For this purpose two font types were selected, Times New Roman (serif) and Verdana (san serif) for the respondents. Verdana was designed only for computer screens display. Readability test on a computer screen was conducted on 30 postgraduate students. Overall, the results showed that there was a significant difference between the readability of serif and san serif font type of on-screen display. The research findings suggest Verdana font type as a better choice in displaying long text for on-screen display.

This paper analyses the extent to which textbook images are designed using the Instructional Criteria for Image Analysis (ICIA) model in textbooks. The ICIA proposed that learning through images involves interaction between the learner, the image, and the activities with images proposed to the student. Images from the main text and activity section of eleven primary and secondary school textbooks on the human body were analysed regarding the extent to which they fit the proposed criteria. Images in the main text were analysed according to size and type, presence of visual elements (graphical elements, colour, enlarged details), verbal elements (caption, labels) and reference to the image within the text, while images in the activity sections were analysed according to learning involved (task type, procedure, processing level). Results show unequal presence of these criteria in both primary and secondary school textbooks. There are some differences between primary and secondary levels (predominant image type, degree of image contextualisation and processing level required). Images should not be considered self-evident. Images should be designed based less on aesthetic and decorative criteria and more on instructional criteria such as ICIA proposed in order to support image-based learning processes and increase the potential value of images as learning tools.

Background: Concerns about health inequalities experienced by people with intellectual disability (ID) have led to many health information materials being created in an "Easy Read" format. This study aimed to understand the practices involved in making information accessible. Methods: Individual, pair and group interviews were conducted involving people with and without ID based in non-profit organisations, academic, and health service settings. Thematic analysis addressed the creation of Easy Read health resources, the format and content of the texts, and how producers imagine the texts are received by potential audiences. Results: Little consensus emerged of the best way to produce Easy Read health information. Lacking systematic feedback, participants described imagined audiences and contexts for their reception. Conclusions: Production of Easy Read resources has become widespread despite current limited evidence of impact. Interactions between social groups involved in the production process and the wider policy and legislative context contribute to this situation.

This experimental study examined how the presence of visual diagrams in 2 science texts affected the independent reading comprehension of 213 fourth-grade students in the southeastern United States. In addition, the relative impact of 3 diagram designs and layout (representational, interpretational, or integrated) was compared with a control. Prior knowledge was measured and statistically controlled for each text. Comprehension measures were a term-selection posttest and a reading comprehension posttest. Overall, on both texts, visual diagrams provide minimal or no added value to students' comprehension above the text-only conditions. Findings also indicated that the integrated diagram may create a condition of cognitive overload for some students. Implications for instructional material design are discussed.

In this article, Michelle Ann Abate examines the typographical features of the comics and graphic novels frequently finding their way into English Language Arts (ELA) classrooms and challenges the viewpoint that they are secondary to prose-only texts, arguing instead that many comics can be seen as requiring more advanced levels of literacy because of their use of all-caps lettering. By recognizing that graphic narratives that are lettered in all-caps are more difficult to read, decode, and understand, teachers, parents, and librarians can make more appropriate and even more effective book recommendations for reluctant and struggling readers.

This article proposes a heuristic that teachers and students can use together to create a vocabulary for discussing the aesthetic aspects of color and typography in document design work. By using this framework, teachers and students can generate a collection of shared "visual topoi" or commonplaces for describing the aesthetic value of color and typography that they can then draw from to inform visual analysis and production work.

There is an important distinction between seeing something and paying attention to it, and this can influence memory. The current study examined incidental memory for the covers and authors of textbooks used in undergraduate psychology courses. Students in several courses were asked to recall the textbook cover design (Studies 1 and 2) and the name of the author of their textbook (Study 2). When the cover design was explicitly connected to a course concept, memory accuracy was positively related to performance in the course. While people may judge a book by its cover, remembering that cover may depend on how well it reflects a key concept of the book. The findings provide novel insight regarding how students attend to book covers and author information and when and why some students remember information that is not anticipated to appear on real-world course assessments.

Experiential Learning Cycle has been applied to the Layout and Graphics Design in Computer Course provided by the Faculty of Communication and Media Studies to the students studying at the Public Relations and Advertising Department. It is hoped that by applying the Experiential Learning Cycle, the creativity and problem solving strategies of the students will be further improved. For the present study, the reactions of the students of the Layout and Graphics Design in Computer Course to adopting Experiential Learning Cycle have been explored.

A single-subject alternating treatment design was used to investigate the extent to which a specialized dyslexia font, OpenDyslexic, impacted reading rate or accuracy compared to two commonly used fonts when used with elementary students identified as having dyslexia. OpenDyslexic was compared to Arial and Times New Roman in three reading tasks: (a) letter naming, (b) word reading, and (c) nonsense word reading. Data were analyzed through visual analysis and improvement rate difference, a nonparametric measure of nonoverlap for comparing treatments. Results from this alternating treatment experiment show no improvement in reading rate or accuracy for individual students with dyslexia, as well as the group as a whole. While some students commented that the font was "new" or "different", none of the participants reported preferring to read material presented in that font. These results indicate there may be no benefit for translating print materials to this font.

The research on short stories for children has focused in Greece mostly on their literary, pedagogical, linguistic and educational aspects. This paper attempts to approach Short Form Stories for children under the light of social semiotics, the main elements being the author's choices in sign-creation process and its interpretation by the reader. In the case of short stories, the recipient is the child, who for the first time tries to decode without help the verbal text and to enter--symbolically but also in reality--to the literate society. This moment of the reader's first encounter with a multimodal text is crucial to her/his future reading behaviour. The paper examines the concept of the 'Horis sosivio' (without lifejacket) series, as evidenced at the level of visual design and the combination of text and image for the construction of meaning, as well as the interpretation of the visual text by preschool children as participants in meaning production.

A personal thinking language consists of verbal and visual means to transform ideas to action in social and work settings. This verbal and visual interaction of images and language is influenced by one's personal history, cultural expectations and professional practices. The article first compares a personal thinking language to other languages (e.g. design, private languages), cites its benefits and identifies its features. The article describes how a visual guidebook can be used as an educational task to document a student's personal thinking language. Recommendations for implementing a visual guidebook are provided for academic and professional settings.

The data featured in this article were gathered during a classroom-based research project with Grade 2 (six- and seven-year-old) children. The overall purposes of the study included exploration of how the development of young children's understanding of elements of visual art and design would affect their comprehension, interpretation, and analysis of the artwork in a selection of picturebooks, as well as the subsequent application of the same elements when they created their own multimodal print texts. A discussion of critical thinking is followed by descriptions of the study's guiding theoretical and conceptual frameworks, as well as an overview of relevant literature, the research context and methods, and the data analysis procedures. The findings from the content analysis of the students' written responses about the artwork of one picturebook are discussed with reference to key concepts associated with critical thinking. The conclusion features a consideration of how students' critical thinking skills and esthetic development can be enhanced by instruction about elements of visual art and design in picturebooks.

Each of the covers designed for the 638 issues of "Music Educators Journal" and her predecessors conveys a bit of our history. These covers are analogous to single frames from a motion picture in that they each tell a piece of the story about how NAfME grew as an association and how we developed as a profession. But many of the individual covers are unique artistic statements in their own right. This article chronicles the various design features of "MEJ" covers from 1914 to 2014.

Recent research on negation has demonstrated that while readers are aware that this text construction is difficult, they seem to be able to do little to improve their comprehension. The present research evaluated whether a change in typeface could improve comprehension and metacomprehension of negation. Results indicated that while readers were aware that placing a word in bold typeface should attract their attention to that item, and therefore improve their comprehension, comprehension did not improve differentially for negation presented in bold. Additionally, readers' awareness of the necessity of attention to the bold component was not specific to negative sentences. (Contains 2 tables.)

Many books, designers, and design educators talk about visual design principles such as balance, contrast, and alignment, but with little consistency. This study uses empirical methods to explore the lore surrounding design principles. The study took the form of two stages: a quantitative literature review to determine what design principles are mentioned most often in discourse on design, and a card sorting exercise to explore the relationships designers, design educators, and design students saw among the most common design principles. Along with the card sorting exercise, I used pre- and post-exercise surveys to gauge how participants felt and thought about design principles and their use in design practice.

Using typography as its exemplar with its lack of clear performance criteria, this article questions what is good design and how to measure a designer's accountability. Evaluation criteria are teased out from various perspectives: credibility, ease of use, stakeholder inclusion in the design process, respect for cultural dimensions and whether it adds to humanity and/or the environment. The article concludes with steps to social change. (Contains 2 figures.)

Objective: To compare the influence of a food guide's shape on its effectiveness and efficiency to convey nutritional information. Methods: A between-subjects experiment was conducted by manipulating the graph's shape (circle, pyramid, or rainbow). Nutrition tasks were used to assess the effectiveness and eye-movement data (number/duration of fixations) to examine the efficiency of the formats. The data were quantitatively analyzed (chi-square, ANOVA). Results: There were no overall differences between the formats regarding effectiveness and efficiency. However, there were differences between the formats in effectiveness regarding 3 of the 5 nutrition tasks (chi[superscript 2]s greater than or equal to 7.044, Ps less than 0.05). Furthermore, viewers' attention was drawn to different parts of the graph, depending on the format. Conclusions and Implications: The results suggest that choosing different formats for practical nutrition communication does not play a major role in effectiveness or efficiency of this communication. However, different parts of the graph are more salient in various food guide formats. (Contains 1 figure and 3 tables.)

Website quality measurement tools have been largely static and have struggled to determine relevant attributes of user satisfaction. This study compares and contrasts attributes of user satisfaction based on usability guidelines seeking to identify practical easy-to-administer measurement tools. The website users assessed business school homepages according to six criteria and fulfilled a randomly assigned yet typical task. After completing the task, respondents assessed the same six website quality/satisfaction criteria again. The consumer-product relationship seems similar to the link between a user and a website. User satisfaction, just like consumer satisfaction, is asymmetric and non-linear. Content and navigation have been identified as key ingredients when users judged website quality, alerting web designers and website practitioners to focus more closely on those attributes. Similar lessons can be drawn for marketing professionals, who typically supervise or determine the content, structure and other website facets. (Contains 5 tables, 9 figures, and 1 note.)

As teachers of writing, the authors know that choices matter: the more choices they can give their students, the better their writing will be--and the better writers they'll become. Many teachers design their courses as writing workshops, so that students make choices about the genres they compose in. They structure writing assignments so that students make choices about topics and organization. They teach students to make choices about sentence structure, syntax, diction, and style. Choices matter for student writers. In their last column, the authors emphasized how professional writing instruction can prompt student writers to make genre choices in context. In this column, the authors focus on another set of choices for students learning about professional writing: document design decisions including choices about page layout, fonts, color, and the like.

Dictionary compilers and designers use punctuation to structure and clarify entries and to encode information. Dictionaries with a relatively simple structure can have simple typography and simple punctuation; as dictionaries grew more complex, and encountered the space constraints of the printed page, complex encoding systems were developed, using punctuation and symbols. Two recent trends have emerged in dictionary resign: to eliminate punctuation, and sometimes to use a larger number of fonts, so that the boundaries between elements are indicated by font change, not punctuation. (Contains 31 figures.)

Little historic context is generally provided regarding design phenomena; ideas, names, events and relationships are disregarded in design's typical superficial coverage; it is as though design exists in a vacuum. This paper seeks to put Helvetica, the face, the font and the movie into context by exploring its relationship to Swiss Design philosophically and practically. The infiltration of Helvetica, the font, into American design practices is also explored, along with some variation on typographic education from both a formal and informal perspective.

Every so often, a technology will saturate the market to the extent that the name of the product becomes a stand-in for the technology itself. While it belongs to the broader genre of slideware, Microsoft PowerPoint is perhaps the best example of software that has achieved that level of ubiquity. Despite Apple's Keynote, the Presentation Editor within Google Docs, Zoho Show, and others, the visual display of sequential slides (most typically during an oral presentation) has become synonymous with PowerPoint. Although it has achieved this level of popularity, PowerPoint is also considered by many to be synonymous with mind-numbing boredom, painful expository bullet points, and the overexposure of the Microsoft clip art library. That is, PowerPoint may be used widely, but it is just as widely disparaged, and often used only begrudgingly. In this article, the authors argue that when used in dynamic, inventive ways, slideware can become an integral and productive part of pedagogical and technological repertoires. They believe it is time to set aside one's mistrust and disdain for software like PowerPoint and consider carefully how it might aid in the teaching of writing. Using the presentation format Pecha Kucha as a model, the authors offer productive reasons and ways to reconfigure the role of slideware in the composing process. Slideware design and delivery can play a creative and inventive role in students' making of writing. (Contains 5 notes.)

We present four studies indicating that the size and design of the typeface in textual material for children aged 7-9 may impair speed of reading and comprehension, and measurement of reading attainment. The first study compared the speed with which sample sentences were comprehended. The sentences were printed in Arial font with an x-height of 4.2 or 5.0 mm. The sentences were verified 9% more quickly when presented in the larger typeface. The second study compared reading age on the Salford Sentence Reading Test when the typeface remained at the initial size (x-height 3.3 mm) throughout the test, and when it decreased in size as usual. The average reading age measured with the larger font was 4 months older. The final studies compared the font Sassoon Primary with the font Verdana and showed that Verdana was read and searched more quickly.

As digital portfolios become more prevalent in teacher education, the purposes and processes for creating them have become contested. Originally meant to be critical and reflective spaces for learning about multimedia and conceived as contributing to professional growth, research shows that digital portfolios are now increasingly being used to provide evidence that a set of teacher education standards have been met for a course. In this article, the authors describe how they designed their digital portfolios as part of an inquiry-based teacher research project and represented their own work--as well as that of their students--in these online spaces. They discuss a number of personal and professional concerns that they encountered while engaged in this process, from the ethics of editing students' work to the online personas the teachers themselves chose to adopt. Issues of audience, purpose, format, and content are framed in discussions of teacher research and portfolio design. Finally, the authors argue that keeping design-based decisions about how and why to construct a digital portfolio in teachers' hands can contribute to lasting professional growth and change.

Written words are laid out in space and exist on the page all at once, but a reader can only read a few words at a time. For readers, written words are trapped in the medium of time. So how can we best organize writing for readers? Traditional techniques of organization tend to stress the arrangement of parts in space and certain metadiscoursal techniques that compensate for the problem of time. In contrast, I'll describe five ways to organize written language that "harness" or bind time. In effect, I'm exploring form as a source of energy. More broadly, I'm implying that our concept itself of "organization" is biased toward a picture of how objects are organized in space and neglects the story of how events are organized in time. (Contains 2 figures and 13 notes.)

With business documents, visuals can serve to enhance the written word in conveying the message. Images can be especially effective when used subtly, on part of the page, on successive pages to provide continuity, or even set as watermarks over the entire page. A main reason given for traditional text-only business documents is that they are efficient and that variations would cause readers to lose time searching for pertinent information. However, an argument can be made that personalized business documents are likely to be received more favorably. Also, if the document is one of several in competition for a contract, the reader will likely feel that the author of a visually enhanced document will be more apt to bring fresh, creative ideas as a partner or as a contractor. A principal stipulation with visuals in documents is that they must enhance or support the message or represent the client or the author in some way. In this article, the author describes how he motivates students in his Creativity and Communication class in the Marketing Department to think and express themselves visually to make them more effective communicators. Visual thinking and communicating gives students a competitive edge in the marketplace and exposes them to additional and alternative communication techniques.

Word processing is part of every writer's set of competencies today, and as readers, their expectations of type have risen well beyond the old Courier font of typewriters. Yet only recently have writers had access to the thousands of different typefaces available today and had such power in making design choices. Type has been much studied and researched as to legibility. Scholarly discussion of the impact of typography, particularly the subtle influence of what many call the "personality" of type, is still in its infancy. This article presents several research studies that attest to the inexact science of the personality of typefaces. The author also provides an outline of her aims in teaching about visual rhetoric and several examples of exercises on typography used in her class.

The phrase "death by PowerPoint" was not born in the offices of Microsoft's competitors; it came straight from the hearts of victimized meeting attendees. Microsoft estimates that at least 30 million PowerPoint presentations are made daily, with many rightfully warranting death verdict assessment. Death sentences often result from a "construction mentality" that focuses solely on the PowerPoint design activity and ignores the need to conceptualize, build content, and plan for contingencies. In this article, the authors discuss four elements that should be considered when developing and delivering PowerPoint presentations. These considerations include: concept, content, construction, and contingencies. (Contains 2 figures.)