Teaching Philosophy
Teaching is a conduit for the empowerment of visual communication. At this moment, students of design should recognize that design will shape our future. Our choices can affect and change behaviors, deliver delight, or help clarify otherwise unclear information. The discipline of Communication Design has shifted beyond the commercial applications that dominated the 20th century, where designers play only a part in the end process of developing an idea, artifact, experience.
Designers today should be equipped to recognize their impact on culture, social, and economic systems. Many other fields have adopted design methods, particularly in design thinking, to embrace design as a catalyst for forward-thinking ideas. Still, without the expertise and specific knowledge of a visual designer, these ideas could fail to communicate.
Visual Communication Designers should understand basic foundational visual principles. Not only for aesthetic purposes but because color choices affect how we perceive content. Consideration of audience when making visual decisions is essential for the visual communication designer. Cultural meanings of typography and color add meaning to designs, age differences impact legibility, social context of the environment the system inhabits, and influence perception.
In typography, a visual communication design student will learn that they are not just selecting a font but giving form to language to inform, clarify, emphasize, and add pleasantries to what might otherwise deter, confuse, overwhelm, or cause disgust.
Language, in its written form, has developed with humanity. Understanding the technological implications that have influenced it and the power of dissemination of ideas that it has allowed is awe-inspiring. When I teach typography, I teach it from this perspective, interwoven with practical skill-based methods and terminology.
Technology is a tool, and while many people believe teaching design is to teach a particular program or skill, I find it necessary to teach how not to be afraid of using new tools. But to work with materials and tools as part of a process for exploration and discovery. Tools range from our hands to machines to coding languages, and students should be comfortable using the best tool for the problem.
Designers today should be equipped to recognize their impact on culture, social, and economic systems. Many other fields have adopted design methods, particularly in design thinking, to embrace design as a catalyst for forward-thinking ideas. Still, without the expertise and specific knowledge of a visual designer, these ideas could fail to communicate.
Visual Communication Designers should understand basic foundational visual principles. Not only for aesthetic purposes but because color choices affect how we perceive content. Consideration of audience when making visual decisions is essential for the visual communication designer. Cultural meanings of typography and color add meaning to designs, age differences impact legibility, social context of the environment the system inhabits, and influence perception.
In typography, a visual communication design student will learn that they are not just selecting a font but giving form to language to inform, clarify, emphasize, and add pleasantries to what might otherwise deter, confuse, overwhelm, or cause disgust.
Language, in its written form, has developed with humanity. Understanding the technological implications that have influenced it and the power of dissemination of ideas that it has allowed is awe-inspiring. When I teach typography, I teach it from this perspective, interwoven with practical skill-based methods and terminology.
Technology is a tool, and while many people believe teaching design is to teach a particular program or skill, I find it necessary to teach how not to be afraid of using new tools. But to work with materials and tools as part of a process for exploration and discovery. Tools range from our hands to machines to coding languages, and students should be comfortable using the best tool for the problem.