Creating visuals as ways of knowing in undergraduate polymer chemistry – Reflections on a neuropedagogy-based approach to infographics as epistemic practices

Infographics are increasingly used in higher science education, yet often as engagement means rather than as legitimate ways of constructing disciplinary knowledge. This paper presents the design and implementation of an undergraduate polymer chemistry course for engineering students in which infographics functioned as epistemic practices across teaching, learning, and assessment. Guided by the Neuropedagogy-based Multidisciplinary Learning Grid model of instructional design, we developed eight infographic tasks implementing different combinations of neuropedagogical principles, including novelty, effort after meaning, verbally mediated reasoning, generation of textual and visual output, spaced rehearsal, oral production, and emotional tagging across the course. The tasks spanned the semester and included a capstone project and final exam items. To help students develop related visual literacy skills and transition from consumers to creators, we applied a hierarchical, structured sequence demanding increasing levels of visual creativity. In parallel, we maintained a reflective diary documenting decisions, constraints, and salient incidents. We synthesise insights from our reflections into design considerations regarding rubrics’ importance, discipline-related challenges, students’ perceived epistemic legitimacy, and selective use of generative AI for imagery integration. We hope this paper contributes to STEM educators seeking to integrate visual creativity into higher education without diminishing disciplinary rigour in intensive courses.