Analyzing and Creating Infographics

Grade Level

7-12

Subject Area

This lesson can be used for math, science, history or English. Since it is introducing a skill once students have the skill it can be used to introduce content in the core content areas.

Author

Nicole Edwards, Skyline High School

Introduction

Have you been looking for new ways to bring in visual learning to your students that connects to a generation who lives on Facebook, twitter, and Instagram? Do you have some students who are struggling with basic analytical skills of finding the main idea and supporting details in a text? Are you looking for new ways to bring in visual learning to your students and facilitate civic action at the same time? Are you looking for ways to scaffold for or accommodate students with IEP’s or for students performing below grade level? If so this lesson is for you. The lessons provided first introduce students to infographics, provide them with a protocol they can use to analyze infographics, and finally teach them how to create their own infographics. Once students can analyze infographics you can use them to introduce new topics in the curriculum and it is an excellent way to engage students around civic issues. You can analyze many different issues like the U.S. Federal spending budget, issues of food production, access to education, historical events, current events, and almost any other topic you can think of by analyzing an infographic. Infographics are also used in campaigns by non-profit groups and political activists groups to spread awareness around different issues and motivate and inspire people into action.  If you would like to go further with the civic action piece you can have your students create infographics and share them on social media or around the school. They are an excellent visual tool to use in campaigning around different civic issues. Even the common core uses an infographic video to help explain the importance of the common core to parents! Click here to see a 3 minute video using visual representation to explain the common core.

Overview

If you are not familiar with what an infographic is, it is a text  that presents information/data along with visual representation (click here to see an infographic on infographics). The students we teach are interacting with visual representation of data on a daily basis through social media. It is a way to connect the work we do in school to their lives in the world and give them the skills they need to accurately decipher the mountains of information they are exposed to on a daily basis. Infographics are also a highly engaging way to introduce students to civic issues and when students can create their own infographics they can share them through social media to create and mobilize civic action in their communities.

This lesson begins by introducing the vocabulary words students will need to know to understand the infographic along with introducing students to what an infographic is. The next two lessons walk the students through two different protocols they can use to analyze the infographic. Once students have learned how to analyze an infographic they can then learn how to create their own. Having a student create an infographic is an engaging way to demonstrate their knowledge around content. This lesson was created for students with IEP’s who struggle primarily with attention and working for extended periods of time. The lesson itself is very scaffolded so feel free to adapt it to whatever pace works best for your students.

Learning Outcomes

Lesson 1: Introducing an Infographic

1. I can define what an infographic is, explain why it use, and why we will be studying it.

2. I can define the 4 key ingredients to an infographic.

3. I can use each new vocabulary word  in a sentence.

Lesson 2: Analyzing an Infographic

1. I can determine 3 first impressions this infographic makes on its audience.

2. I can find 3 main points that the infographic is getting across in its story.

3. I can find 3 supporting details (data) for each of the main points I found.

Lesson 3: Creating an Infographic

1. I can create an infographic that has a story, data, a good first impression, and a logical strategy as measured by the grading rubric.

Duration

Lesson 1 55 Minutes

Lesson 2 55 Minutes

Lesson 3 The actual lesson just teaches students how to use the website to make infographics. You should plan a week or more for students to conduct research and prep before doing this lesson and they will need about a week in the computer lab to complete their infographics, unless they have access to a computer at home.

Context

This unit is an introductory unit to give students a skill and a protocol they can use throughout the school year to analyze issues. It takes over the course of the week and all the lessons will be broken down into three lessons. It is likely to take less time in a gen-ed classroom so it is clustered into 3 lessons which should be completed in 3 consecutive days.

Once students get the key concepts of an infographic they can then be taught to create their own infographics which is addressed in another unit. When students can create their own infographics it can be used to take action on an issue. Before students can create an infographic they need to collect data. This can be done in whatever way you would normally have students prepare for a research project. The first time I had students create an infographic they did it about the Vietnam War. I provided them with articles and a selection of topics that they could chose to create their infographic about.

Below is a brief overview of how I completed the unit with students. The lessons included are for Day 1, Day 2, and Day 14

Day 1: Lesson 1 Introduce key parts of an Infographic

1. The first impression

2. The story

3. The data

4. The strategy

Introduces key vocabulary words in the introductory infographic

Day 2: Lesson 2  Students analyze an infographic using the protocol to discuss the four key concepts of an infographic

Day 3: Written Analysis: Students write a 1 paragraph analysis determining weather or not the infographic did a good job presenting the information with the four key concepts.

Day 4-13: Students collect data around a topic or theme which they will be creating an infographic for. Students will need to complete

1. The first impression

2. The story

3. The data

4. The strategy.

The worksheets are provided but there is not a detailed lesson plan as it is fairly self explanatory.

Day 14: Lesson 3 Teach students how to create an infographic

Materials

Lesson 1

• Emotional IQ Infographic: Project on the wall

• http://visual.ly/emotional-iq-and-you

• Four poster boards and enough markers for each group

• Hand Out 1.1: The four parts of an infographic

• Hand Out 1.2: Vocabulary Sheet (HW)

Lesson 2

• Best if done in a computer lab. If not you can print out the infographics and project the colored version on the wall.

• http://visual.ly/emotional-iq-and-you

• Handout 2.1: Infographic Protocol

Lesson 3

• This lesson needs to be completed with computers

• Print out the step by step directions of the lesson

• The website is easel.ly

• Students should already have completed the following assignments:

  • Handout 3.1: First Impression

  • Handout 3.2: The Story

  • Handout 3.3: The Data

  • Handout 3.4: The strategy

Links to Lesson Details

Lesson 1: Introducing an Infographic

Lesson 2: Analyzing an Infographic

Lesson 3: Creating an Infographic

Assessment and/or Extension Ideas

Lesson 1

• If you do not want to do the assignment in two days you can give the students the infographic and have them try to identify these four parts of an infographic as homework if they are more advanced.

• You can ask students to find an ad in a magazine, newspaper, or online ad and try to identify the four points of a story.

• You can have students compare and contrast the  four main concepts to what you would look for in a story or literary analysis.

• Once you have completed this lesson with your students you can use it in a variety of ways around different content in the future. You could use it as a way to introduce new content, it could be a modified assignment for content learning for students with IEP’s, an extra credit assignment, a way for students to demonstrate they have mastery of certain content, and I am sure many others that I have not yet thought of.

Lesson 2

• Once students have this protocol down it can be used to introduce new material. For example if you were doing a unit on the civil rights movement, you could pull up an infographic on the civil rights movement and have students complete the protocol. You could then have students make predictions, draw conclusions, or use it as a way to get students thinking about the upcoming unit.

Lesson 3

• Have students present theirs to the class and each student give s grade.

• Have students try the infographic protocol on it to see if they were able to get the four points across the way they wanted to.

• Have students circulate their infographics on facebook or instagram as a civic outreach project depending on the topic.

• Use this as a choice activity for students to demonstrate content knowledge in a summative assessment.

• Use as a modification on an essay assignment for students with IEP’s or who tend to demonstrate a great ability to demonstrate knowledge learned through a visual medium.

Common Core Standards

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.7 Integrate and evaluate content presented in diverse media and formats, including visually and quantitatively, as well as in words.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.W.8 Gather relevant information from multiple print and digital sources, assess the credibility and accuracy of each source, and integrate the information while avoiding plagiarism.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.SL.5 Make strategic use of digital media and visual displays of data to express information and enhance understanding of presentations.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.6-8.7 Integrate visual information (e.g., in charts, graphs, photographs, videos, or maps) with other information in print and digital texts.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RH.9-10.7 Integrate quantitative or technical analysis (e.g., charts, research data) with qualitative analysis in print or digital text.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.6-8.7 Integrate quantitative or technical information expressed in words in a text with a version of that information expressed visually (e.g., in a flowchart, diagram, model, graph, or table).

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RST.9-10.7 Translate quantitative or technical information expressed in words in a text into visual form (e.g., a table or chart) and translate information expressed visually or mathematically (e.g., in an equation) into words.

Civic Action Components

Analyzing issues (using digital as well as analog resources)

• Identify an issue that matters to them and their community (as individual students, small groups, or whole class).
• Develop a question to guide their inquiry (may be provided by the teacher).
• Document their analysis.
• Analyze the factors that lead to the issue.
• Consider multiple perspectives on the issue (interviews, surveys, experts, etc) and thoughtfully deliberate those perspectives.
• Assess strategic ways to address this issue (through first understanding what has and is currently being done).
• Develop a deeper understanding of the content of the course and its standards while the content of the course helps students understand the issues deeply.

 

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