Semiotic Continuum

Semiotic Continuum describes the range from abstract symbols to concrete models. Symbols are the most abstract (lit. pulled-away) and deconstructed category of meaning, but as such, they are the most mobile and manipulable. Models, on the other hand, are the most concrete (lit. grown-together) and constructed category of meaning with the highest information density and complexity. Indices are in the middle — they are more simplified than models, allowing more mobility and manipulability, but more complex and information dense than symbols, empowering more accurate and comprehensive understanding.

This framework categorizes objects encountered and created in experiential learning like Project-Based Education (PBE).

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The over-all framework follows C. S. Peirce’s Semiotics categories except in the use of “model” instead of “icon” due to a shift in the meaning of icon from the religious idea of a concrete representation of something divine or ephemeral towards icon in computing — which is definitely a small, simplified, mobile symbol.

Rather than applying semiotics mainly to literature and language through a formal epistemology as is often the use of Peirce’s framework, this continuum applies the categories to an experiential epistemology (see [7] Epistemology) more similar to the Abstraction Continuum found in education and cognitive development.