DO VISUAL THINKING STRATEGIES IMPROVE THE LEARNING EXPERIENCE?

Today, we live in a reality that solicits us with an ever-increasing amount of visual stimuli. This trend contributes to making changes in different areas of human social practices, one of these is the field of education. In this context, driven by the technological revolution we are going through, we are registering a progressive move away from learning/teaching models of a transmissive nature and, at the same time, a move towards interactive learning/teaching models. Among new learning methodologies that seem to fit into this scenario, "Visual Thinking Strategies" (VTS) is gaining increasing resonance because it mainly contributes to the development of various skills such as observation, dialogue, creative thinking, and critical thinking that can be transferred to other subject areas, and, moreover, because it can be adapted in and to different environments and targets. It was originally developed for its use in museum education, but today its application has spread to schools, universities and health care institutions around the world. This paper aims to explore the present literature in order to identify the state of the art regarding the application of Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) within the school context. In addition to defining VTS, this paper will explore the theoretical frameworks underpinning them and to which they are commonly associated, their application protocol and the effects demonstrated by studies in the literature, with a focus on interventions involving primary and secondary schools.