VISUALIZATION AS A GUIDE FOR COMPOSING

Visualization techniques involving the analysis of pictorial informati on photographs, paintings, and geometric forms) are used to guide stud ents' understanding of the composing process. For the first explorator y study sets of papers written by students enrolled in an introductory level composition course incorporating these techniques were compared with sets of papers written by students in another section of the sam e course to determine the effectiveness of visualization for understan ding the process of revision. Students in a second study completed a q uestionnaire designed to assess students' memory for visualization tec hniques as well as their tendency to apply these techniques to new sit uations. The results suggest that visualization techniques were effect ive in guiding the revision process (Study 1). Further, results show t hat students remembered both specific details about the pictorial info rmation used to guide the composing process (outlining, analyzing, rev ising) and the underlying principles informing these techniques (Study 2). Visualization techniques are discussed in terms of their potentia l usefulness in reducing the cognitive demands implicit in the composi ng process.