Towards a Common European Framework of Reference for Visual Literacy

 

A group of European specialists of didactics, curriculum developers, teacher trainers and scientists in the field of the school subjects Arts, Design, Art Education, Visual Communication (since 2010 organized in the European Network of Visual Literacy – ENViL) has been working since 2013 on the project CEFR_VL  (acronym for European Framework of Reference for Visual Literacy). The European Union supports this project under the Lifelong Learning Programme in 2014 and 2015.

The project focuses on visual skills that learners can acquire in the classroom or in non-formal settings. We define these competencies as the interplay of knowledge, skills and attitudes. They enable the learner to resolve domain-specific tasks and problems of everyday life in the field of visual communication (e.g. the understanding of works of art or of media images, the design of objects, sketches or visualisations). The members of the consortium will submit the results on this basis in the spring 2016.

The informal European Network for Visual Literacy (ENViL) was founded in 2010 and consists of more than 60 members from eleven European countries. All members conduct research in the field of art education. The steering group comes from The Netherlands, Austria, Hungary and Germany. The network works closely together with InSEA.