An Evaluation of Visual Displays in Basal Readers and Social Studies Textbooks
type: CreativeWork
description: Well-designed textbooks are vital for an effective elementary curriculum. Research on textbook design has focused on prose and nonprint media such as artwork and photography, but there are few investigations on the more abstract data displays, or visual displays. This study presents a quantitative and a qualitative evaluation of visual displays in elementary basal readers and social studies textbooks. The four research questions were: (1) How do visual displays that are found in basal reading series differ as a function of publisher, grade level, type of display, location of display, and instructional questioning? (2) How do visual displays found in basal reading series compare with those found in social studies series? (3) What is the nature of the relationship of the text with the visual display within the social studies and basal reading series? (4) How effective are the visual displays in social studies and basal reading series in communicating information?
abstract: Well-designed textbooks are vital for an effective elementary curriculum. Research on textbook design has focused on prose and nonprint media such as artwork and photography, but there are few investigations on the more abstract data displays, or visual displays. This study presents a quantitative and a qualitative evaluation of visual displays in elementary basal readers and social studies textbooks. The four research questions were: (1) How do visual displays that are found in basal reading series differ as a function of publisher, grade level, type of display, location of display, and instructional questioning? (2) How do visual displays found in basal reading series compare with those found in social studies series? (3) What is the nature of the relationship of the text with the visual display within the social studies and basal reading series? (4) How effective are the visual displays in social studies and basal reading series in communicating information?
author: Hunter, Barbara Mayhall
keywords: Education, Elementary, Education, Curriculum and Instruction
date published: 2014-12-15T18:51:57Z
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:26:00Z
provider: University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/69193