The integration of multimedia into the humanities classroom is drastically altering the landscape of education. What makes multimedia so valuable is that it incorporates a wide range of technologies, such as images, audio, film, hypertext, video, and interactive discussion capabilities (such as online chatrooms, forums, and listservs) to produce dynamic learning environments. Multimedia is also valuable because it can be used to make a single assignment appeal to different types of learning styles, better represents experience with the world, and motivates learners. Several research studies have confirmed that students tend to respond favorably to multimedia educational environments (Koroghlanian). In sum, the value of multimedia education is currently focused on the following issues: it benefits students with high visual orientation (Smith), adapts to individual differences and learning styles, allows learner to control their path of study / learner-controlled environment (Schroeder), places learning into the hands of users (Stemler), and permits instuctors to customize interfaces for different classes.
This unit is designed to introduce you to multimedia and to raise issues and questions about its use in education.
- "Multimedia for the Web," from the Web
Developer's Virtual Library - "This section describes and demonstrates
the various media available for Web developers, providing sound and graphic
experiences beyond the classical static images and hypertext."
Questions to consider while listening to an audio document