Multimodal remediation of research articles through infographics and graphical abstracts

Abstract

Students’ engagement in multimodal remediation of learning material in the form of slideshow presentations dominates universities. Yet, diversification of learning artifacts through the creation of more diverse types of multimodal content is scarce. The current article therefore proposes an innovative project during which students summarize research articles (RAs) by remediating their content into two increasingly popular communication formats: infographics and graphical abstracts (GAs). Following step-by-step activities that enhance student agency, learners self-regulate, work in groups, and learn to design these types of visuals. We discuss both modes and practices and present them visually in the format of instructional infographics, providing insights compiled in our own reflective journals as course facilitators.

Courses

Professional Communication, Academic Communication, Science Communication, Technical Writing, Social Science Research Methods, English for Research Purposes, English for Specific Purposes, English for Academic Purposes, Visual Literacy, and Multimodality courses. The activities of multimodal remediation of academic texts into infographics and GAs may be adapted for all levels of students, including those who plan to continue with research activities in the future.

Objectives

The proposed activities will help students to: (1) extract essential information from the RAs; (2) become acquainted with expert expectations regarding infographics and GAs (i.e. author guidelines in scientific journals); (3) critically evaluate the construction criteria of visuals for scholarly publication; (4) communicate research content (scientific data) visually by learning to design two popular formats for communicating research; (5) reflect on how effective multimodal construction is compared to the ones created by peers or the examples provided; (6) familiarize themselves with the target academic discourse; (7) foster learner agency, self-regulation, and autonomy; and (8) develop effective team working and collaboration subskills (e.g. responsibility sharing, taking into account the perspectives of others, etc.).