Tools for Teaching Visual Literacy in Biology

Join Crystal Uminski on Friday, October 2nd, for a conversation about "Tools for Teaching Visual Literacy in Biology."

Artificial intelligence (AI) has rapidly improved in its ability to produce polished and realistic visual representations of biological structures, yet most AI-generated images still contain factual inaccuracies, inconsistencies, or errors. These types of errors that often make AI images “bad” representations of biology can make AI images powerful pedagogical tools. As biology education relies on images to model structures, processes, and systems that cannot be directly observed, students need to develop skills interpreting, evaluating, and critiquing the visual representations of the unobservable phenomena they encounter in their biology courses. The error-prone and uncanny qualities of AI-generated images can provide rich opportunities for active learning in which students identify inaccuracies, articulate why AI images are incorrect, and refine their understanding of how biology diagrams convey meaning. The flaws and inaccuracies that make AI-generated biology diagrams…