The primacy of text is taken as an unquestionable fact by many of the current generation of instructors. Those who use images in lecture are even looked upon as betraying the true faith of text-based learning. This sets up a disturbing conflict, between students who prefer to learn visually and their professors, who are accustomed to learning by reading or listening. The result is apparent in many of our classrooms. Students who have received relatively little training in their preferred learning style may be faced with instructors who often are determined that any adjustment to be made is totally the responsibility of the students.
Multimedia offers a means for compromise.
It combines text and images in a way that's congenial to students and also should be acceptable to faculty. It also provides a solution to the long- standing teacher complaint that students fail to recognize cultural references. This past year, for the first time I included a picture of a gas attack, including one man without a mask, who had obviously been poisoned. The student response was an audible gasp. The picture had emphasized my point in a way that could not be duplicated by any amount of eloquence.