Interpreting Artifacts

Last Friday my composition students, working on their eportfolios this semester in our active learning classroom, studied and commented on a photo-essay in their textbook. We talked then and on last Wednesday about how they will be required to include artifacts, especially images, on their eportfolio pages to accompany their texts, and, therefore, how important it is to appreciate

what texts convey, what photos convey, and how they can complement or inform each other in the right combinations. At the very least, they should be thinking about what photos or other artifacts they might wish to include, and, perhaps, even create a file to collect them. The benefit of discussing these photos in smaller groups is that the individual students may more likely realize that "reading" images, or other artifacts, is not straightforward nor destined to end in consensus.

Tomorrow they will work together at their tables on five photographs, one assigned to each group through Canvas. Their instructions are for each group to discuss its assigned photo: what might the photographer have had in mind, what the photo might have to say, how they might respond to it, and how other people might respond to it. Each group is to list the pertinent details they have discovered in its photo on the glass board near its table; then each, in turn, will offer their peers their interpretation(s) of the photo. Finally, to illustrate (I hope) the complexity of interpreting artifacts (or events or persons), each group is to solicit their peers in the room for their opinions and interpretations.