the outcome of training with
Soren Breiting*, Danish University of Education, Copenhagen.
What is Graphic Review ?
graphic review is a summary of the content of a part of a training
event, like a part of a workshop, a course, a seminar, a presentation
or an excursion. It is used to remind all participants of the
content of the programme they have been through as a background
for the next part of the training. It is prepared by a few participants
and the process of using graphic reviews is a nice example of
a ‘learner centered teaching’ technique linked to
a collaborative learning process.
first developed the idea when I was planning a course for professionals
involved in the development of environmental education in South
Africa. All participants should be able to speak English, but
I had the feeling that communication could be difficult if it
was solely depending on proper English language skills. Accordingly
I wanted to come up with a tool that could help participants reflect
on their learning and at the same time give me as a teacher feed
back on how the participant’s interpretation went on. It
was mandatory that it should be regarded as ‘fun’,
stimulating and encouraging for the participants.
the first experience the feedback was very good, and the used
format for graphic review seemed to fulfill the expectations.
Since then I have made use of graphic reviews in many settings
with very different kinds of audience. Now we have a refined procedure
including the first introduction to it that seems to function
well in general.
am sure many other educators are using similar techniques, but
anyway here is the basic description building on my experience
of what we call ‘Graphic Review’.
whole thing is much more simple in practice than when you have
to read about it. Sorry we have to wait with the illustrations!
How to prepare Graphic Reviews ?
us take a typical format for training like a 3 days workshop.
During the introduction to the workshop the first day the participants
are introduced to graphic reviews (see later for tips about how
to do this efficiently).
Normally I ask for volunteers to sign up to make graphic reviews
in teams of 2-3 participants. Each team should cover like a half-day
programme. Often we use a third team for the evening programme.
preparation of the graphic review by the team means
To put the content of the programme on an overhead
transparent with special emphasis on representing ideas and
important points of view and information in a graphic format,
and only ad words when needed for proper communication (e.g.
names and facts), in cases symbols etc. can’t do the work.
team designs the sheet as a draft on paper and makes the flow
of events clear.
the team makes a small drawing in the upper left corner showing
that at 8.30 o’clock a named person introduces the training.
Such a drawing can be useful for participants to be reminded
of the event, but it is important that the graphic review isn’t
just showing events but uses the indication of events to highlight
the content: main ideas, point of view and other kinds of information
there might be important to be reminded about.
the draft on paper is prepared the team draw the graphic review
on the overhead sheet. Here different colors are used to highlight
and to differentiate the content.
make use of fine line permanent OH pens. The experience is that
fine line pens invite to much more detailed and reflected final
graphic reviews, and we use permanent pens because we will normally
keep the sheets until we have the next training, may be half
a year later.
is a point in having only one sheet to summarize the content
of the programme. This forces the team to select the most important
aspects, and it is suitable enough for the review process.
We indicate the date, time and if needed the venue, plus the
names of the team on the OH sheet.
that the task of making graphics becomes an obstacle for some
one to be fully confident in the making of a graphic review.
The challenging aspect of the task should be focused on how
to convey the main ideas and content, and not to the artistic
quality of the graphics.
How to present graphic reviews ?
flow through the presentation is very important to understand.
To review a day’s programme will normally take 20-30 mins,
I normally schedule the presentation of the graphic reviews from
the day before (or last training) just after we start the programme
in the morning. In this way the graphic review process will help
bring the content and thoughts from the training before into the
minds of the participants for the new day's programme.
flow follows these steps:
1. The team puts their OH transparent on the OH
projector and keeps quiet. The audience is allowed time enough
to go through the graphic review and make their own interpretation
of what they see and read. During this phase the teacher should
signal a genuine interest in the presented graphic review.
2. The team explains in proper detail what they have found of
value to incorporate in their graphic review.
3. The team (or the chair person) asks for comments from the audience,
addressing aspects to have clarified from the team, missing points
from the last programme or possible misunderstandings.
4. All kinds of comments should be regarded as a help to the team,
and the whole process should be regarded as a collective effort
to have the best record of the programme made available for the
future use of all.
5. The teacher will through this feed back session have fine possibilities
to raise important issues and correct misunderstandings and omissions
in a constructive way.
6. The comments should be regarded exactly as that, i.e. that
the team will make use of them in their own understanding and
afterwards finalize their graphic review. Please never have any
corrections happen directly on the OH projector during the presentation.
In the spirit of helping each other comments on spelling belong
to a ‘private’ session with the team after the presentation.
7. Before the workshop finish all participants should be provided
with a copy of all graphic reviews for their files.
How to introduce graphic reviews to a new audience ?
have found that the most efficient way to introduce the idea of
how to produce a proper graphic review is as follows.
a very good graphic review from another training event or produce
a demonstration example of similar quality. Produce another graphic
review about exactly the same training event, but let in this
second version the events play the total dominating role. At the
same time these to examples will show two ways of economize with
the available space on the OH sheet.
introduce the first well-done graphic review to the new audience
by simply explaining all the content and what it refers to.
Afterwards show the simple one that only displays the events and
not the ideas etc. And raise the question about which of these
two versions will best help participants to remember the content.
Some variations of using graphic reviews
the mentioned example the graphic reviews are produced in the
evening of the volunteer team every day. But graphic reviews are
really fine in normal school situations, too, as long as they
are not used too frequently.
are especially fruitful when a lot of unconventional things happen
during the teaching. It could be special days, excursions, fieldtrips,
visits to the school etc. that needs time for reflection and further
anyhow there are very good results of using graphic reviews in
for example foreign language teaching, too, without any special
events. In such cases the pupils are expected to make their own
graphic review on a single page of paper. And only a sample of
pupils work will be presented to the class.
Pitfalls using graphic reviews
some of these pitfalls into account when using graphic reviews
analysis of the basic idea will show that the helpfulness of
using graphic review fits to many aspects of meaningful learning
and social constructivism. And at the same time it can be applied
to the most traditional format for information dissemination,
like presentations and lectures.
Breiting is an Associate
Professor at The
Department for Curriculum Research, The
Danish University of Education, in Copenhagen.
has worked intensively with the improvement of teaching and
learning situations in schools though educational research and
development including teacher training in Denmark, Scandinavia,
Hungary, Southern Africa and latest in Thailand. Most work has
been related to democratic
environmental education, education
for sustainable development, the concept
action competence, science education and cross-curricular
and interdisciplinary teaching. Teaching methods and learner
centered techniques have been of special interest, like storyline
method and concept
mapping, as well as how to improve the learners outcome
of excursions and fieldwork. To mention a few projcets: the
and the ITMF programme of ICT and science education, see example:
. See also Miljøedderkoppen
and environmental education .
Soren's BLOG at uddannelse.blogspot.com