Selecting Audio Visual aids for effective teaching

Selecting Audio Visual aids for effective teaching

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Answer:

The importance of audio visual (AV) technology in education should not be underestimated. There are two reasons for this; one, learning via AV creates a stimulating and interactive environment which is more conducive to learning; two, we live in an audio-visual age which means that having the skills to use AV equipment is integral to future employment prospects. Therefore exposure to AV technology in education is imperative.

 

Audio visual material must be seen in their relationship to teaching as a whole and to the learning process as a whole, until the teacher understands the relationship between audio visual material and teaching learning process.

 

Audio visual materials are produced, distributed and used as planned components of educational programs. It helps the process of learning that is motivation, classification and stimulation. A.v. aids are multisensory materials which motivate and stimulate the individual.

 

It makes dynamic learning experience more concrete realistic and clarity. It provides significant gains in thinking and reasoning. Audio visual aids are sensitive tools used in teaching and as avenues for learning. These are planned educational materials that appeal to the senses of the people and quicken learning facilities for clear understanding.

 

PRINCIPLES TO BE FOLLOWED FOR THE EFFECTIVE USE OF A.V. AIDS:

 

• Audio visual materials should function as an integral part of the educational program.
• A.v. aids should be centralized, under specialized direction and leadership in educational programs.
• An advisory committee consisting of representative from all areas of curriculum should be appointed to assist in selection and coordination of a.v. materials.
• An education program should be flexible.
• A.v. material should be carefully located to eliminate duplication, easy accessibility and convenient use.
• A.v. material should be available whenever and wherever they needed for effective utilization as an integral part of curriculum.
• Budget appropriations should be made regularly for a.v. education programs.
• • Periodic evaluation to be done to assess the function of, utilization and expenditure of the program.

 

AV technology in schools

AV technology has been used in schools for decades, but only in the form of a TV and video player to show short educational films. Now it is the computer that shows these educational films and home work is also being done increasingly on PCs.

 

Children learn differently and audio visual equipment gives teachers the chance to stimulate each child’s learning process with a combination of pictures, sounds and attention grabbing media. We are surrounded by audio visual equipment and children are keen to understand technology and keep up to date with applied science. Having this opportunity in the classroom helps to facilitate learning.

 

More and more schools are taking advantage of AV technology to teach their students. This equipment can be used to present information to students but also the fact that they are interacting with AV technology on a daily basis also makes them proficient in using technology.

 

Not exposing children to different forms of technology is depriving them of vital learning opportunities that could benefit them in later life for example through increased career opportunities. AV lessons should not just consist of children working in pairs on a Power Point presentation or rewriting a piece of work using Word, ICT should be challenging, exciting and fun. Webster’s Encyclopedia Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language, defines Audio-Visual aids as “training or educational materials directed at both the senses of hearing and the sense of sight, films, recordings, photographs, etc used in classroom instructions, library collections or the likes”. The term has also been defined by (Dike,1993) as; those materials which do not depend solely upon reading to convey meaning. They may present information through the sense of hearing as in audio resources, sight, as in visual resources or through a combination of senses. Indeed, the variety of such resources is a striking characteristic.

 

According to (Anzaku,2011) “the term audio-visual materials is commonly used to refer to those instructional materials that may be used to convey meaning without complete dependence upon verbal symbols or language”. Thus according to the above definition, a text book or a reference material does not fall within this grouping of instructional materials but an illustration in a book does. Some audio-visual components are in the nature of process and experience, for example, dramatizing an event or a procedure or making diorama. Some of the audio-visual materials like the motion pictures require the use of equipment to release their latent value.