A proposal for future Primary School Teachers. Collaborative environment designing strategies from children’s Visual Culture

Abstract

From the Faculty of Education in the University of Alicante, we provide teacher training students with a suitable approach in order to create activities that are on the side of Collaborative Work and Problem Based-Learning (PBL), based on Visual Culture created from children’s television series. We propose a design strategy for children’s collaborative learning environments. This approach is based on TV series scripts, as they are suitable to be developed in schools. According to the strategy, some stages must be carried out so success is guaranteed in the didactic design field. First, the TV serial must be appropriate and well chosen according to the students’ learning needs. Second, narrative structures, dynamics, characters, roles, play-based elements, scenery and all contexts must be analyzed with a critical and positive approach. Finally, an activity and its contexts are especially designed as well as the assessment method, taking into consideration all the above mentioned elements. The main Collaborative Work features as well as complex definitions will be illustrated in this paper by means of images, sequences and stereotypes which may be recognizable for all type of audiences such as children, youngsters or adults.