Discussing Reading Pictures with Dr Philip Price at the UAB Postgraduate Seminar

My recent recorded discussion with Dr Philip Price, now archived on Zenodo (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17307676), gave me a chance to revisit the ideas behind Reading Pictures and to clarify why visual-first pedagogy continues to shape the way I teach. The full transcript is available in the seminar paper “Language in Focus: A Conversation Between David J. Mitchell and Dr Philip Price”, which has also been deposited on Zenodo and forms the backbone of this reflection. Language in Focus

Why Pictures Matter

The conversation began with the core idea: images lower the psychological pressure that often paralyses learners. When students describe an image, the focus shifts away from self-monitoring and toward interpretation. This naturally reduces the “affective filter,” improves fluency, and creates an immediate communicative purpose. This principle, visible throughout the transcript, came directly from my lived classroom experience rather than theory. Language in Focus

Where Theory Meets Practice

During the interview, we connected visual learning to established frameworks—Krashen, Swain, Vygotsky, and Dual Coding Theory. These aren’t abstract references; they map directly onto the visual cycle used in lessons:

• See (comprehensible input)

• Describe (output)

• Refine (scaffolding)

It’s a simple loop that makes grammar meaningful because it responds to what learners actually try to say. Language in Focus

Photography as Pedagogy

A key part of the discussion highlighted how my photography background shaped the method. Composition, framing, and visual inference translate naturally into language teaching. When students “read” a picture, they’re already practicing the same interpretive skills we expect in writing. Language in Focus

Cultural Variations and Neurodiversity

We also spoke about how the method adapts to different cultures and learner profiles. Students in East Asia, often conditioned toward perfectionism, relax when language tasks are image-based. Neurodiverse learners—especially dyslexic and ADHD students—benefit from reduced textual load and increased visual grounding. These insights came directly from case studies across Saudi Arabia, Japan, South Korea, and the UAE. Language in Focus

Precision Without Fear

One criticism of visual teaching is that it might drift into subjectivity. In the discussion, I addressed that directly: creativity opens the door, but grammatical precision closes it. The method always cycles back to accurate form—just in a way that doesn’t freeze learners before they even begin. Language in Focus

Looking Ahead

The conversation closed with the future: workshops, collaborative research, and building an open visual-language resource bank. We also touched on technologies like AI, AR, and VR, imagining environments where learners manipulate virtual objects while narrating actions—an embodied extension of the method. Language in Focus

Related Recordings

The interview builds on the broader project archived on Zenodo under “The Book…” (https://zenodo.org/records/17521642). Together, these deposits form the public research trail for Reading Pictures, showing the academic and practical foundations behind the method.