—to gain awareness of how typography functions and affects our 
everyday visual and digital lives.
—to begin to build the basic awareness and skill base necessary 
to use type effectively in visual communication.
— to understand how messages are conveyed effectively with 
typographic elements, including concepts related to legibility 
of letterforms and readability and texts in both print and 
digital media.
— to become critical of the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of 
ubiquitous typographic and textual messages
— to gain a basic knowledge of typography, including fundamental 
elements of typographic anatomy, nomenclature, terminology, and 
historical evolution.
— to begin to develop an awareness of the needs of 
viewers/readers through an understanding of the extreme 
subtleties of spacing inherent in typography.
— to understand information hierarchy, including how to 
construct and improve clarity through typographic means.
— to explore basic typesetting concepts through the typographic 
tools of relevant design and word processing software.

— overview of typographic history focusing on pivotal moments, 
such as the invention of moveable type and the evolution of 
printing technologies that affected letterform and font design 
from medieval roots to contemporary type, with particular focus 
on the development of roman types.

— basics of typographic terminology, anatomy, hierarchy, and 
font nomenclature.

— completion of responsive assignments that will develop 
observation and critical skills through reflection on both 
provided and collected vernacular typographic samples.

- completion of a series of visual problems and exercises that 
will both familiarize students with the inherent subtleties and 
attention required in creating effective typographic messages 
and encourage development of facility with the basic typographic 
tools of relevant design and word processing software.