Visual Rhetoric and Accessibility Lesson

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Assignment by Jackie Cano Diaz, Bedford New Scholar 2023

In ENC1101, we focus on the rhetorical choices made in composition and how we engage with the sociocultural influences surrounding these choices. Expanding on this, I teach my students about how visuals are rhetorical choices. This activity scaffolds towards our first major assignment, creating a multimodal literacy narrative. Students gain an understanding of how they might best enhance the multimodal aspects of their literacy narrative.  

The lesson utilizes "Understanding Visual Rhetoric" by Jenae Cohn from Writing Spaces. After going over the introduction as a class, dividing the class into 7 groups allows each group to focus on an element in the chapter (Line, Color, Shape, Size, Space, Value, and Texture). Each group reports back, summarizing what they read. Next, as a class, students use the elements of visual rhetoric to describe what they notice in two versions of the same logo, determine what the purposes of the given logo are, and judge which version of the logo is most effective in achieving those purposes. After, we discuss the differences between alt text and captions, how to add alt text on our classroom management software and Microsoft Word, and practice creating alt text descriptions for the two logos. 

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