The poster deals with visuals for teaching about German speaking countries in German as a foreign language textbooks. The objective of the poster is to present the final findings of dissertation research based on an analysis of selected textbooks used in Czech lower secondary schools in order to contribute to the description of the role of visuals as a medium for teaching about German speaking countries in European context and for the development of intercultural communicative competence.  

In current foreign language didactics the importance of teaching culture is connected not only with providing facts and information about the target culture but with development of intercultural communicative competence. From this point of view, visuals can be considered cultural products which present a perspective of the target culture (Biechele 2006: 19).  For this reason, greater emphasis is placed on the development of visual literacy in intercultural context.

Research in psychology and communication shows a strong advantage for text-relevant visuals in comparison with typical language (see Carney and Levin 2002). From this point of view, there are some general features which visuals should possess to make learning effective.

Visuals are characterized by different types (see Ballstaedt 1997, Weidenmann 1991), they present various sociocultural contents (see Byram 1993) and possess different functions (see Carney and Levin 2002, Biechele 1996, Pýchová 1990).

Nevertheless, there is lack of information and reflection on the instructional procedure with visuals in student’s and teacher’s books used in Czech schools. A systematic description of visuals and the use of visuals for teaching culture in German language textbooks is needed. For this reason and in respect of the above mentioned theoretical works, the main aim of the research is to describe what types, functions and contents of visuals for teaching about German speaking countries and the development of the intercultural communicative competence are to be identified in German language textbooks used in Czech lower secondary schools. 

We intent to answer the following research questions:

What types of visuals for teaching about German speaking countries are to be identified in the selected textbooks?

What contents of visuals for teaching about German speaking countries are to be identified in the selected textbooks?

What functions of visuals for teaching about German speaking countries are to be identified in the selected textbooks? 

The presented research is divided into two parts. The first and essential part of our research is based on the research questions and explores the visual component in selected textbooks. The second part of the research focuses on the use of visuals from the teachers’ perspective, which is about to supplement findings of the first part.

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