Fleming, G., Spaleny, E. & Peprnik, J. (1967). The didactic organisation of pictorial reality in the new language teaching media. Praxis des neusprachlichen Unterrichts, 14, 160 - 174.

«Twelve years have passed since James J. Gibson propounded his theory of pictorial perception, and particularly his propositions regarding the greater or lesser fidelity of pictures referring to textual segments. That was before audio-visual language learning theory presented language teachers and workers in the field of applied linguistics and psycho-linguistics with special problems arising out of text/picture relationships in audio-visual language teaching media.

The problem of the didactic organisation of pictorial reality in the new language teaching tools, with particular reference to the readability of graphic symbolisation in such materials, and the pedagogic and psychological implications arising out of the learners' confrontation with such media is one of the most pressing in the whole gamut of educational research priorities.

The autors of this paper hope that it may shed more light on some of the key issues attendant upon the creation of audio-visual materials supposed to mediate specific foreign language segments in a teaching situation.

J. B. Carroll informs us that other things being equal materials presented visually are more easily learned than comparable materials presented aurally.

Even though the objective of teaching is the attainment of mastery over the auditory and spoken components of a foreign language, an adequate theory of language learning should take account of how the student handles visual counterparts of the auditory elements he is learning and help to prescribe the optimal utilization of these counterparts.

[...]

How does a picture, a means of communication function? Under what conditions can a picture be said to function for the purposes of facilitating the learning or the teaching of language content? We are speaking both of material used for description, narration containing dialogue, of material used for contact work, introducing structures or material used for consolidation. [...]» (p. 160)