Abstract:

Courses about Graphic Design are difficult to teach because its abstract content. However, there is a teaching method which could make easier to students understanding the most basic concepts before start to design a newspaper. We propose the use of conceptual maps based on principle of knowledge as a social construction as opposed to theories of lonely learning. We used a qualitative methodology of focus group among our students. We organized them in groups of four and we prepared a set of questions to be discussed between them before they start editing the conceptual map. The aim of our research is to know problems and advantages of using conceptual maps applied to learn Newspaper Design. As a hypothesis we state learning is not only a personal and active process of meaning construction, but this process works better if it happens in a collective learning process. We will use theories of social constructivism about the “zone of close development”. These declare sometimes is not possible, for one student, to get access to learning objects by their own, which could be possible with the collective work of their teachers, other students and agents stimulating the use of beforehand concepts for knowledge construction. In our teaching experiment, we think conceptual maps can become a very useful tool to make easier the process of learning for difficult and specialized subjects when it happens in a collective environment of work. From our experience the collective activity of editing a conceptual map allows our students can get an information map to don’t lost in its own process of learning. We will explain our experience with the use of a specific kind of software to edit a collective conceptual map for a course of “Journalistic Information Design”. As a conclusion we can say our students get a deeper understanding of contents which is manifested in a better accomplish of learning goals planned in our course.

Keywords:

Conceptual Map, Learning Object, Social Constructivism, Newspaper Design, Graphic Design, Cognitive Pshycology.