“The presence of visual elements in today’s teaching and learning is increasing as the integration of images and visual presentations with text in textbooks, instructional manuals, classroom presentations, and computer interfaces broadens” (Benson, 1997; Branton, 1999; Dwyer as cited in Kleinman & Dwyer, 1999). In every classroom, there are many different types of learners. Student A is a visual learner. Visuals are important because they clarify the material being taught and make learning more permanent. “Though we use all our senses to learn, it appears that seeing is the sense where most of our learning comes from. So, this tells us that the most effective way to clarify and bring understanding to what is being taught is to show the children.” (add information) Importance of Visuals in The Classroom Incorporating visuals in our lessons have dramatically enhanced teaching and learning. “Visual aids are tools that help to make an issue or lesson clearer or easier to understand and know using pictures, models, charts, maps, videos, slides, real objects etc. Research of Cuban (2001) “indicated the psychology of visual aids as under, 1% of what is learned is from the sense of TASTE, 1.5% of what is learned is from the sense of TOUCH, 3.5% of what is learned is from the logic of SMELL, 11% of what is educated is from the logic of HEARING and 83% of what is learned is from the sense of SIGHT”. Visuals help educators reach their lesson objectives in a different way than just speaking. Using clear pictures, graphs, anchor charts, maps etc., clarify your objectives as well as help create interest for the lesson being taught. With visuals, concepts and ideas are no longer “just words” but words plus “images”. It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words and this is true. “Visual aids can be very useful in supportive a topic, and the amalgamation of both visual and audio stimuli is particularly effective since the two most important senses are involved (Burrow, 1986)”. Research indicates that: ϖ Every individual has the tendency to forget. Proper use of visual aids helps to retain more concept permanently. ϖ Students can study well when they are inspired properly through different visual aids. ϖ Visual aids grow the accurate image when the students see and hear properly. ϖ Visual aids provide complete example for conceptual thinking. ϖ Visual aids create the environment of interest for the students. ϖ Visual aids help to increase the vocabulary of the students. ϖ Visual aids help the teacher to get some time and make learning permanent. ϖ Visual aids provide direct experience to the students. As a special education teacher, I encourage my co teacher as well as the general education teachers on my team to implement visual strategies into their everyday lessons. Visual aids engage the student to the content more effectively. According to the research, hearing information is not enough for learners to retain the information. Visual aids stimulate and maintain a student’s interests, accelerates the learning as well as reinforce the content being taught. Visual aids should be used when introducing a new skill or strategy (Archer & Hughes, 2011). Here is an example of how important it is to see something than to just hear about it. Just imagine a picture of 13-spiraled circles with four of the circles on top of the others. Inside of the spirals of the circles are different colored ovals of blue and yellow. There are also black and white areas that separate the ovals. As the spiral goes to the middle of the circle, the ovals get smaller and smaller blending into a black dot. If you were to move your eyes around and look at this picture it appears that the spiraled circles are moving. Now that you have a picture in your mind of what is being explained, look below and see if this is what you imagined. Chances are what you imagine this to look like is much different from the actual image. With the use of visuals, the image was easier to understand and picture. The visual aid in this example made “the learning experience more real, more accurate and more active”. “Learning is a complex process and visual aids arouse the interest of learners and help the teachers to explain the concepts easily (Singh, 2005)”. Examples of Visual Aids There are many visual aids available these days. Visual aids can be used for mathematics, science, English language arts as well as social studies. Research shows that using visuals enhances learning with different degrees of success. Visuals can be used for; flashcards for vocabulary terms, timelines to help the children see the progression of events, maps for social studies or even to “map” out a math problem etc. These types of visuals have generally resulted in increased retention of text information presented in a lesson (Issing, 1990; Levie & Lentz, 1982; Pressley, 1977). Within my classroom, I tend to upload my lessons onto google classroom as well as my graphic organizers so that students can use them throughout the school year. This helps Student A organize his thoughts prior to beginning writing assignments, with teacher made exemplars uploaded, as well as helps him with his math word problems. I like to use colorful graphics to attract the eyes of all my students. The use of educational technology has enhanced teaching and learning drastically (Pressley, M. (1977)”. “Kleinman and Dwyer (1999) examined the effects of specific visual skills in facilitating learning. Their findings indicate that the use of color graphics in instructional modules as opposed to black and white graphics promotes achievement, particularly when learning concepts.” During my research, I was interested in finding ways to incorporate visuals more with mathematics. I have found very interesting facts. Teaching Mathematics with Visual Aids I’ve realized that teaching mathematics with visuals makes the content fun, engaging as well as interesting. The use of instructional materials maintains the interests of students during class. Student A enjoys learning when he sees real objects, pictures and different forms of visual aids. He relates easily with the lesson when I use visual aids. He responds to the lesson especially when he can manipulate any of the teaching materials being used. When visual aids are displayed around the room, it helps Student A master the skills. It is said that in mathematics, real objects are the best types of visual aids(Debrenti,2013). In mathematics, there are so many skills where real objects can be used. You can use marbles and food when counting, you can use balls and handkerchiefs to get students to recognize different shapes and you can use cereal boxes or even the classroom to teach volume. There are so many different visuals that can be used in teaching mathematics. As an educator, you can make your visuals as creative as you want. It is important when making and presenting visuals, you use materials that correlate with the techniques and methods you want learned. When choosing and making visual aids you want to make sure that: ϖ The visual aids are big enough to be seen by everyone in the classroom ϖ The visual aids clearly explain the topics concepts and ideas ϖ The visuals should grasp everyone’s attention ϖ The visual aids should transmit the ideas that the teacher wants to convey The below examples are anchor charts that are in my mathematics classroom. When I taught my students area and perimeter, I used these anchor charts. I was sure to use a variety of colors to catch the interests of my students, I made sure that the anchor chart was big enough for everyone to see and I also made sure the charts explained the topics concept and ideas. The visuals above are perfect examples of visuals multiplying the students level of understanding. Whenever Student A gets stuck on a problem, he knows that he can just look around the classroom for the visual aid that corresponds to it. Studies show that when students are given visual, rather than having to draw it out themselves, it contributed to more problem-solving achievement. Although using visual aids can be extremely effective in the classroom, research shows that there are some errors that can be made when students use visuals. Throughout this research, I have learned the importance of visual aids in the classroom and the implementation of visuals in the classrooms for various subjects. All five of the studies I’ve researched came to a common conclusion that visuals are effective and an efficient tool in special needs classrooms. “As studies show success in thinking and learning visually instead of or in addition to traditional lectures and verbal description, a shift in technique is required. Students need to learn visually and teachers need to learn to teach visually (West, 1997)”. Visual aids in mathematics will aid Student A by using visuals to enhance his processing of new skills and lessons being taught. Visual aids will appeal more than one sense at the same time which increases Student A’s retention and understanding level. Knowing the positive effects of visual aids, especially in mathematics, I will use them for every lesson.