WHEN ARE NARRATED ANIMATIONS MOST BENEFICIAL FOR STUDENT LEARNING?

The Climate Communication website (www.climatecommunication.org) includes a series of narrated animations covering various climate change graphics. A subset of these narrated animations is evaluated through a mixed-methods approach and compared to still frame figures with the same climate change graphics. Evaluation methods include: eye tracking to determine where, when, and for how long participants looked at certain aspects of the imagery; multiple-choice questions to gauge how well participants understand the material presented; pre- and post-questionnaires to measure prior knowledge and learning gains and to assess the participants’ attitudes toward climate change; and short interviews to identify and understand the characteristics of the imagery participants like or benefit from most. Findings suggest narrated animations are best when the imagery is complex (e.g., when multiple datasets are shared in the same figure). Additionally, narrated animations were more beneficial for the lower performers in this study (as defined by their performance on the multiple-choice questions) than the still frame figures.