Pollution and Environmental Protection

EDCI 337: Multimedia Design

Jialong Li&Jiahao Lin& Ling Jiang

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Overview

The focus of this topic is that students can gain an in-depth understanding of the root causes and hazards of pollution and environmental damage while understanding that environmental protection can make better use of natural resources. Students can clearly recognize the harm caused by pollution to the environment and understand the importance of environmental protection.

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Lesson Objectives

• Identify the factors of human activity that have impacted the equilibrium of an
  ecosystem and the culture attached to it.
• Investigate some factors related to human activity that affect ecosystems.
• Explain the impact pollution has on our ecosystems.

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Read/Watch

Watch: Learn about Pollution | Environment Defilement | Cartoon (5:46)- Let’s learn three different types of pollution: Air Pollution Water Pollution Soil Pollution.

Watch: The Story of Plastic (Animated Short) (4:15)- pulls back the curtain on the plastic pollution headlines, revealing the true causes and consequences of the global plastics crisis.

Watch: How to Take Care of the Environment – 10 Ways to Take Care of the Environment (3:40)- Let’s learn what the environment is and how we can look after it better. These are our ten tips and advice to look after the environment

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Content

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Powerpoint

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Practice

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Application

• By learning about pollution, students develop their daily habits of environmental protection.
• Students can also promote environmental protection so that more people can understand the importance of environmental protection and guide them to develop good habits in life.

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Reflection

• What can we do to stop plastic pollution?
• How does pollution affect the ecological environment of the earth?
• What would the world be like without plastic?

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To Do This Week

• After-class Discussion: Discuss the pollution around you with the group members brainstorm ways to deal with related pollution, record it in the form of an essay, and share it with your classmates in the next class.
• Read related articles and integrate relevant reading materials with the learning content of the class and write a post-reading essay
• Watch the videos about pollution provided above.
• Discuss with others why these pollutants exist, how they affect human life, and what people can do to improve this situation.
• Make a survey to investigate people’s awareness of pollutants and environmental problems.

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Theories and Principles Guiding Our Lesson

Merrill’s First Principles

The topic of our project is real-world problems. Students are aware of the pollution problems and experience them in real life. They already have a foundation for new knowledge. The new knowledge is demonstrated in the PowerPoint and videos. We also provide multiple choices to make sure students understand what they learned on this topic. After they have enough comprehension of the topic which is the factors and impacts of pollution and how to prevent and improve them, they are expected to take actions to prevent or improve the situation, at least avoid creating more pollution.

Mayer’s Theory of Multimedia Learning.

According to Mayer’s Theory of Multimedia Learning, we know that the number of information humans can process at any given moment is limited, so we have targeted the design of the teaching content, focusing on the three leading causes of pollution, impacts, and solutions. In this way, we made the entire teaching structure clear and logical. Besides that, we avoid all irrelevant materials, including complex videos and unnecessary reading materials, to minimize learners’ extraneous cognitive load.

Backward Design

It has to be admitted that the use of backward design played a crucial role in designing the course. Before we started, we knew that we should determine the course’s expected goal first and proceed to the course design. In this way of thinking, we consider how to let students grasp the knowledge more firmly by learning the course while they can provide feedback to teachers through after-class activities, rather than only designing activities that students are interested in. And we believe it can make students learn more efficiently and gain more learning outcomes.

Design Principles for Multimedia Presentations

In making PowerPoint, we referred to Cognitive Load Theory and Mayer’s principles for presentation design. First, we determined the main message to be expressed, and then all the content was discussed around the theme—the main causes of pollution, impacts, and countermeasures. Other than that, we didn’t add overly complicated text or additional information to create an extra burden for the viewer. At the same time, we also used clear color matching for each slide’s background and text color, and we left enough negative spaces. The purpose is to make it easier for the audience to focus on the text content, and they will not feel impatient due to visual fatigue. Same for the infographic design, we focused on alignment and balance and optimize the color of the design. The color palette is limited. Two fonts and different sizes are used to distinguish the topic and examples. We used the structure of one picture and one explanation to help focus and use repetition of this structure. The style of the infographic is consistent to make sure that it is clear to read.

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Reference

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqHp03RRTDs&t=44s

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO3SA4YyEYU&t=19s

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2YgM1Zw4_E