When teaching, it's important that the materials you design not only solid have solid content, but they also need to be graphically designed in a way that facilitates understanding. Here are some tips on how to create activities with excellent content and visual appeal:
Design
- Use SmartArt to create graphic organizers. You can also use mindmapping or brainstorming sites like bubbl.us or mindmeister.com to do this as well.
- Leave plenty of white space. This will help to reduce clutter and let the student see what's most important.
- Make the title is specific and easy to find. This way a student doesn't spend valuable time trying to understand less important words.
- Use bold, italics, font sizes, etc. to help draw the eye to what’s most important on the page.
- Try to repeat the same design style for the repeating components (like directions).
- If you use graphics, make sure they support the text.
Content
- Make sure the language AND tasks are written at a level accessible for the intended students.
- Vary the type of exercises you include. Try to match the difficulty of task to the level of student.
- Make language as simple and straightforward as possible.
- Base your activity only on material the students have learned already. Including new vocabularly or other unlearned information will only confuse students.
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