Abstract
In contrast to the dominant thrust within media pedagogical discourse, which focuses on the reception of photographs in school lessons, this article focuses on photography, the productive image-making of pupils in the context of subject lessons. On the basis of a Bernese study dedicated to the connection between the mode of representation and the learning process, the article explores the question of how observation tasks solved photographically differ from those realised linguistically, what information they provide about children's learning and construction processes, and how they could be used for learning in science teaching. The case-contrasting comparison makes clear how different, even disparate, the photographic solution paths are that the children have taken, and how little they - in contrast to the children working linguistically - allowed themselves to be guided by instructions. This constructive aspect of the medium of photography could therefore - if used purposefully and reflected methodically - serve to realise a more self-directed learning in which the subjective view of the world would be integrated as part of the construction of knowledge.
