Visualization Empowerment: How to Teach and Learn Data Visualization

The concept of visualisation literacy encompasses the ability to read, write, and create visualizations of data using digital or physical representations and is becoming an important asset for a data-literate, informed, and critical society. While many useful textbooks, blogs, and courses exist about data visualization—created by both academics and practitioners—little is known about 1) how learning processes in the context of visualization unfold and 2) what are the best practices to engage and to teach the theory and practice of data visualization to diverse audiences, ranging from children to adults, from novices to advances, from students to professionals, and including different domain backgrounds. Hence, the aim of this Dagstuhl Seminar is to collect, discuss, and systematize knowledge around the education and teaching of data visualization to empower people making effective and unbiased use of this powerful medium.
To that end, we aim to:
• Provide a cohesive overview of the state-of-the-art in visualization literacy (materials, skills, evaluation, etc.) and compile a comprehensive handbook for academics, teachers, and practitioners;
• Collect and systematize learning activities to inform teaching visualization across a wide range of education scenarios in the form of a teaching activities cook-book.
• Discuss open challenges and outline future research agendas to improve visualization literacy and education.
Besides those outcomes, we aim to facilitate interdisciplinary research collaborations among attendees; researchers, practitioners, and educators from a wide range of background including data visualization, education, and data science.