AUDIO-VISUAL AIDS AND THE LEARNING PROCESS—By Ben F. Holland

AUDIO-VISUAL AIDS AND THE LEARNING PROCESS---By Ben F. Holland AUDIO-VISUAL AIDS AND THE LEARNING PROCESS
Ben F. Holland

Learning is usually directed toward the formation of desirable habits, skills, attitudes, tastes, appreciations, and ideals; and to the acquisition of various types of knowledge, including percepts, images, and concepts. Audio-visual aids may be used to help pupils or students acquire these outcomes with the greatest of ease and economy of time, and to help them retain what is learned so that it will function in a useful manner whenever it is needed.

Most of the learning that goes on in Bible classes is the memorizing of words and statements that the pupils do not understand.' Our problem is that of making what we teach meaningful to each pupil, and to stimulate such learning activities as observation, discovery,' creativeness, and reflective thinking in addition to memorizing. The use of audio-visual aids is one important aprpoach to this problem; and this approach involves the selection and utilization of objects, models, demonstrations, examples, pictures, drawings, graphs, charts, and the like. Each lesson may involve one or more types of materials. In directing the learning process by means of audio-visual aids, it is important to keep in mind the factors discussed below.

Attention.
The use of audio-visual aids helps to attract and hold attention. It is easier to attend to objects, pictures, graphic representations, and the like
than to words. Such an item is the center of attention for an entire group, and the social atmosphere tends to heighten attention. Anything that guarantees attention helps to induce learning.

Observation and Discovery.
Audio-visual materials may be used to stimulate observation and discovery. With an item exhibited, the teacher may stimulate active observation and discovery, and even the recording of facts. The pupil is an active explorer rather than a passive listener. This type of learning is interesting and absorbing; it challenges and stimulates. It does not kill interest.

Imagery.
Words may stimulate inaccurate imagery. Audio-visual materials may insure the accuracy of imagery. Everyday experiences help little in un-derstanding statements referring to the long distant past. The past must be recreated in objective, pictorial, or dramatic forms before it can be understood, or imaged, with any degree of accuracy. Many Biblical references suggest a great amount of imagery that needs to be aided by the use of audio-visual aids. The parables spoken by the Lord were based on concrete objects and situations with which we are unfamiliar. “A sower went forth to sow,” “The kingdom of heaven is like unto a fishnet,” “Behold the fields are ripe and white unto harvest,” are examples. How may these be made meaningful to a person who has never seen a sower, a fishnet, or a field of ripened grain?

Repetition.
Learning requires a considerable amount of repetition. One contact with items being learned does not suffice to make learning permanent. The use of audio-visual aids makes it possible to repeat what is being learned at any time repetition is needed. One may show and reshow various types of materials, and also review particular materials studied a long time ago. A picture, an object, a filmstrip, or a film may be brought back to the pupil any time there is a need for relearning or recalling what was learned a month or a year ago.

Symbolism.
Thinking would be a ponderous process without the use of symbols, but symbols that are not understood have little value in thought and com-munication. In order for symbols to have meaning, they must be grounded in concrete experience. A word, a fable, a parable is given literal meaning until its symbolic nature is understood. In order to have meaning, symbols must be evolved from particular facts or other products of observation. Audio-visual aids are essential to the development of the meaning of symbols.