A Sequential Model for Video Viewing in the Foreign Language Curriculum

This article presents strategies for reading visual images. It illustrates how visual systems inform the process of listening for the meaning of foreign language words and phrases. 1 We propose that the ability to read picture sequences as meaningful systems constitutes an important “visual literacy” that is essential for verbal comprehension of videos: An ability to recognize that visual images—such as what the camera focuses on, how much or how little is shown, and which people or objects are visually dominant or subordinate to others— suggest a pattern of values. Identifying values implied by these pictorial messages, we propose, helps students recognize how pictorial messages are underscored and elaborated in a video's spoken language. For this undertaking, we first briefly review key research and pedagogy in the field and then present an exercise sequence for video use that proceeds from visual to verbal systems appropriate for beginning language instruction. In conclusion, we suggest ways in which our strategies apply to a larger curricular program that integrates media in its overall learning objectives.