Page 11: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (June 2022)

tual descriptions is comparatively very

The Author low. Therefore, where textual media does the job, it is wise to use it.

Goldberg

Images, like text, are powerful when

Murray Goldberg is CEO of Marine Learning Systems. it comes to conveying information. They

Email: [email protected] can also be helpful in explaining concepts - especially in conjunction with text.

Imagery can also be helpful in training simple skills. The choice of which (text or imagery) to use depends on the kind of information being taught. For example, if our goal is to provide a trainee with the ability to recognize an object or to ? nd components of that object (a button for example), then, as they say, “a picture is worth a thousand words”. Annotated images can be especially powerful in ef- ? ciently conveying certain types of infor- mation.

Other types of imagery such as graphs and diagrams can be used to visualize complex information or processes. These still fall into the “knowledge transfer” category of learning goals, but for the right kind of information they can be in- credibly effective.

Keep in mind that images can almost never be used alone. At the very least, they require textual descriptions to guide the trainee in terms of what is being taught, and what to look for on the image.

And ? nally, like text most forms of imag- ery are relatively inexpensive to maintain and update.

Each media choice has its own strengths and limitations. I wish to stress that it is not necessarily the case that a more ex- pensive or more sophisticated media is better for all learning applications. And as discussed in the previous article, com- bining media types (especially text with some other media type) will almost al- ways yield better educational results than any one media alone. The bottom line is this: use the media that will do the job, keeping in mind that whatever choice you make, you’ll need to not only create it, but also maintain and update it.

The next edition of Training Tips for

Ships moves on to some of the more so- phisticated media types. Until then, sail safely and stay healthy!

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