[Athen] who understands learning theory?

[KRISTA L. GREEAR]

I'm in a graduate program in Educational Technology and am currently in a Multimedia course. This class is based on the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia. I am having an intellectual crisis because this theory makes the following assumptions:


*        that humans have a channel for processing visual/pictorial representations and a separate channel for processing auditory/verbal representations

*        each channel has a limited capacity and

*        active learning occurs when learner engages in cognitive processing (Moreno & Mayer, 2002).

But in our work (serving students with disabilities), I don't think assumption #1 holds up. I am not confident that someone with a TBI has both channels. Or if they do, the channels may interact at different capacities. For example, a blind student may not be utilizing their visual/pictorial channel because it has been "replaced" by a tactile channel (tactile is not mentioned at all in this course).

I am struggling because this theory is widely popular in the Educational Tech/Instructional Design field and I don't want future professionals to be taught how to create media for only those who don't have disabilities.

I have no research to back up this gut feeling (yet). But I am itching for more. Can anyone shed light? Or point me to resources the focus specifically on disability and Cognitive Theory of Multimedia?

Reference
Moreno, R., & Mayer, R. E. (2002). Animation as an aid to multimedia learning. Educational Psychology Review. 14(1). 87-99.

Best,

Krista Greear
Accessible Text & Technology Manager
UW Disability Resources for Students
greeark at uw.edu<mailto:greeark at uw.edu> | disability.uw.edu/<http://disability.uw.edu/%22%20%5Ct%20%22_blank>
[ada-banner]

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman12.u.washington.edu/pipermail/athen-list/attachments/20160728/65abf4b6/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.png
Type: image/png
Size: 29831 bytes
Desc: image001.png
URL: <http://mailman12.u.washington.edu/pipermail/athen-list/attachments/20160728/65abf4b6/attachment.png>