Zhen Xiong

Histories in Comics

Abstract

'Histories in comics' was a research aiming to investigate the relationship between comic design and primary school students' history education. History usually was regarded as a complex subject for young students. Previous research pointed out that comics could be an effective medium in history education. It is meaningful to discover, refine and test the features of comics in pupils' history education. The outcome of this research was a historical comic and a general workflow of making a historical comic.

This research was both practice-led and practice-based. It included exploring the process of creating an engaging history educating comic to obtain knowledge about structure and details in comic design. There were three phases in this research, following the action research cycle. All the practices in this research were processed in iteration. The historical analysis was the primary research method. It focused on reviewing literature and investigating the precedents. Besides, the research was a case study around the history of the Chinese "Chu" state, which was relevant to my hometown. The Chu state has no evidence of being implemented in any syllabus and has challenges in explaining its time and connection.

This research proved that comics could assist children's history education. Concrete visual language could explain the historical time concept with the panels' combination. The historical character design could refer to children's physical features and be exaggerated to engage young readers. Meanwhile, The comic's story could centralise on historical characters and could combine historical objects in storytelling with helping students remember the knowledge. A historical comic could be generated by 7 steps. These insights could be tested and critiqued by making more comics for more complicated topics (such as politics, people and cultures), for different readers' groups and for different languages in my future practices.

  • The purpose of this phase was to define children's history learning challenges and learn the principles of creating comics. This phase revealed that understanding the time concept and finding the connection between histories and children themselves are complicated. Comics have the potential to solve these problems. Making a historical character's story as a skeleton to integrate other historical materials could be a meaningful strategy for designing a historical comic.

  • The purpose of this phase was to define children's history learning challenges and learn the principles of creating comics. This phase revealed that understanding the time concept and finding the connection between histories and children themselves are complicated. Comics have the potential to solve these problems. Making a historical character's story as a skeleton to integrate other historical materials could be a meaningful strategy for designing a historical comic.

  • This phase aimed to Investigate children's features and practice relevant making comics theories. This phase revealed that children's legibility depends on their ages. Children's comics' character design can be exaggerated without following the actual children's body proportion. Designing the comic's characters and typography was essential based on the target groups' characteristics.

  • This phase aimed to Investigate children's features and practice relevant making comics theories. This phase revealed that children's legibility depends on their ages. Children's comics' character design can be exaggerated without following the actual children's body proportion. Designing the comic's characters and typography was essential based on the target groups' characteristics.

  • The purpose of this phase was to modify the comic's details and reflect on the workflow. This phase revealed that the combination of panels, comic font, and storytelling could influence readers' emotions. The relevant relics could be edited to be part of the storytelling to increase their appearance in the comic. The comic's aesthetic should be consistent. The font and illustration's style should be similar. Designing the panels and page layout should be simultaneous.

  • The purpose of this phase was to modify the comic's details and reflect on the workflow. This phase revealed that the combination of panels, comic font, and storytelling could influence readers' emotions. The relevant relics could be edited to be part of the storytelling to increase their appearance in the comic. The comic's aesthetic should be consistent. The font and illustration's style should be similar. Designing the panels and page layout should be simultaneous.

    • Artefacts

    • Select Bibliography

    1. Eiser, W 1985, COMICS & SEQUENTIAL ART, POORHOUSE PRESS, U.S.A.

    2. McCloud, S 1993, Understanding Comics : the Invisible Art, Northampton, MA: Tundra Pub.

    3. Zagkotas, V 2019, 'Are comic books appropriate for teaching History? Three suggestions for Greek Primary Education', Education 3-13, Vol. 47, no. 3, pp.358-365.

    Filed under

    publication

    Keywords

    Comics

    History

    Children education

    Illustration

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