Student Researcher & Advocate

My name is Amelia Holderness. Visual Voices grew out of questions I have been thinking about for years. My own experiences as a student with dyslexia, my work with younger children, and my involvement in neurodiversity advocacy at school have made me curious about the many different ways children communicate, participate, and learn.

I became especially interested in what happens when communication is not limited to spoken or written language. How can images, symbols, gesture, drawing, movement, visual schedules, classroom labels, or introductory ASL help a child understand an idea, express a thought, or participate more fully in a classroom? Which of these approaches are most useful for different learners? And what can educators learn by paying closer attention to the ways children are already communicating?

Visual Voices is my way of exploring those questions. I am reading the research, talking with educators and researchers, visiting classrooms, and paying closer attention to what I see in my own work with young children. I want to understand when visual and multimodal communication helps children participate, express themselves, and build early literacy skills.

This is an ongoing research project, not a finished set of conclusions. As I visit more classrooms, speak with more people, and encounter new research, my questions continue to change. The ideas, resources, field notes, and findings on this site will grow and evolve along with the project.