Republic of the Philippines

ISABELA STATE UNIVERSITY

BUILDING AND ENHANCING NEW LITERACIES

ACROSS THE CURRICULUM
(SEd Prof. 312/EEd Prof 312/TLEd Prof 312/PEd Prof 312)

A Self-Paced Learning Module for College

Students

Module 2

MULTILITERACY AND
MULTIMODAL LITERACY

IMEE M. TALAUE
 Module 2: MULTILITERACY AND MULTIMODAL LITERACY

Introduction
Teaching in the 21st century has significantly different roles than in the
past. Teachers are no longer seen as commanding and imposing of learning,
but rather guides, instructors, and advisors through the learning process.
They are there to provide support and feedback to students, as they access
their own goals through the reading and creation of multimodal texts. We
need to open their minds to the world around them, and how they fit, and
create meaning of it. Through overt instruction, critical framing, situated
practice, and transformed practice (New London Group, 1996), teachers need
to assist students in reading, retrieving, and evaluating the multiliteracies that
they are afforded through technology.

          In that, teachers need to be active purveyors of digital citizenship,

through teaching students how to make responsible choices online, through
discussions about ethics, responsibilities accountability, and online safety.

          Serafini (2011) argues that “to expand students’ interpretive repertoires,
teachers need to extend their own understanding of a variety of perspectives,
theories, and practices used to comprehend visual images, graphic design,
and multimodal texts. Each visual medium has its own language, structure, or
visual syntax that needs to be understood” (p. 349). We live in a digital age of
change, and while teachers cannot be experts on all digital mediums, they
need to be involved in continuous professional development in order to stay
current.

          Teachers can also expand their learning through collaboration with
students. Educators now teach the digital age, and whether they like it or not,
their students can often out-knowledge them in the area of technological
creativity. Teachers need to create a safe collaborative environment where
students can work together to assist each other’s learning. In our futuristic
society, the workplace is now very collaborative. By teaching students the
skills to work collectively, educators are providing students with the necessary
skills to be successful outside of school.

          Inquiry based learning is the way of the future, and students are often
the experts in their own learning. The teacher’s role is to develop this need for
inquiry, and challenge students thinking, and get them to think critically about
the texts they are engaging with, with an emphasis on the student’s
perspective. It is equally important however for teachers to help students
successfully access the materials and tools that they need in order to inquire
effectively.

         
 When engaging in multiliteracies pedagogy, it is most important that
educators not limiting students to pencil and paper tasks, but rather
encourage them to show their knowledge in modes that suit their abilities and
understanding.  

Learning Outcome
 Discuss components of multiliteracy pedagogy; and
 Describe the different strategies in integrating multimodal literacies in
instruction.

Learning Content

In today’s world, people have many ways of creating, designing,

interpreting and understanding meaning through multiple modes such as
videos, hypertexts and graphics. However, in the modern classroom, many
teachers are still ‘catching up’ with multiliteracies pedagogy. As a result of
this, educators are struggling to teach students to effectively become readers
and designers of 21st century literacy.

Through the links, videos, articles, and philosophies on this website, I

propose a multiliteracies pedagogy for educators to adopt in order to teach
students of the 21st century, and beyond, how to become confidently
multiliterate, in a society that demands it.

Topics for Module 2

Topic 1. Multiliteracy Pedagogy

A. Components of Multiliteracy Pedagogy
1.1 Situated Practice
1.2 Overt Instruction
1.3 Critical Framing
1.4 Transformed Practice
Topic 2. Introduction to Multimodality
Topic 3. Multimodal Literacies in Instruction
Topic 1. Multiliteracy Pedagogy
Anstey & Bull (2006) define a multiliterate individual as someone who “is
flexible and strategic and can understand and use literacy and literate
practices with a range of texts and technologies; in socially responsible ways;
in a socially, culturally, and linguistically diverse world; and to fully participate
in life as an active and informed citizen” (Bull & Anstey, 2007, p. 55). In order
to create a world of multiliterate individuals, who are capable of contributing to
the many facets of life in 21st century, literacy educators need to move
beyond monomodal instruction and assignments, and need to think about
how digital tools, and texts can help students be best prepared for the future. 

COMPONENTS OF MULTILITERACIES PEDAGOGY

Teachers need to adapt, change, and design lessons, using new

technology, approaches, models, and pedagogies that help students
understand the multimodal world around them. Serafini (2011) suggests that
“as images come to dominate the texts that adolescents use to communicate
and make sense of their world (e.g., Internet, textbooks, instructional DVDs,
video games, magazines) readers will need to draw from a new set of
strategies, vocabularies, and processes for interpreting these multimodal
resources” (Serafini, 2011, p. 348). 

In order to provide students with these ‘new strategies’, the New London
Group (1996) suggests that educators need to cultivate a pedagogy that
incorporates four main components: “situated practice, overt
instruction, critical framing, and transformed practice” (Cope & Kalantzis,
Language Policy and Political Issues in Education, 2008, p. 205). These four
constituents should be reflected on, incorporated and woven into the
foundation of every aspect of multiliteracies pedagogy.
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
SITUATED PRACTICE
Through the use of situated practice in the classroom, educators promote
student interaction, discussion, and sharing of ideas. This is yet another
example of how literacy is a social practice, where students are able to
develop their knowledge through relating and connecting to their prior
knowledge with others.

The New London Group (1996) defines situated practice is an “immersion

in meaningful practices within a community of learners who are capable of
playing multiple and different roles based on their background and
experiences” (NLG, 1996, p. 85).

While it is important that students are sharing ideas through discussions in

the classroom, in the 21st century and further into the future, teachers should
be also be using, creating and encouraging the use of situated practice
outside of the classroom through the use of technological tools. There are a
variety of online collaboration tools that students can use to continue to
communicate through online discussions with communities of practice.
Using discussion in online environments help students interact through
drawing on their schema, and allowing them to present information informally
through a variety of creative modes rather than just speech. Through the use
of online environments where students can situate their learning, students can
“understand the value of classroom activities within a community of learners.
Teachers can potentially help students understand and learn multiple
perspectives of their classmates and teachers.” (Biswas, 2014)
OVERT INSTRUCTION
While it is important for students to engage in situated practice, they still
need explicit instruction, especially when learning, understanding and creating
meaning using a variety of modes. “Overt instruction helps learners focus on
important features and gain experiences that allow them to understand
systematic, analytic, and cognizant explanations of different modes of
meaning” (Biswas, 2014). 21st century literacy, and beyond, requires that
students design and create texts in a multitude of modes. It is important that
educators use overt instruction to explain how to use these modes effectively. 

That is not to say that overt instruction in a multiliteracies environment

requires students to rote learn skills through repetition and memorization, but
rather that teachers need to introduce skills that build on students
understanding, and situated practice, so that they are better able to produce
multimodal texts (Angay-Crowder, Choi, & Yi, 2013).
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
 Again, it is important to weave all of the four components of
multiliteracies pedagogy together to effectively educate students. Through
overt instruction, teachers can introduce a skill or topic, develop the
metalanguage, and then simply lead and monitor student progress through
the critical framing, transforming, and situated practice stages of learning. It
also helps develop an awareness of what, how, and why they are learning
about a specific skill, before applying it in other learning stages.

CRITICAL FRAMING

Situated practice, and overt instruction, are two important components of

multiliteracies pedagogy, however, critical framing is where students are able
to construct their own meaning, through reflection, analysis, comprehension,
and application of their learning. (New London Group, 2006). Mills (2006),
articulates that “critical framing enables students to critically analyse and
interpret the social and cultural context and the political, ideological, and
value-centered purposes of texts.” (Mills, 2006)
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
 Critical framing, is one of the areas, where there is a drastic change in
moving from traditional literacy practices to multiliteracies pedagogy,
especially when it comes to reading and creating texts. Students are no
longer asked to read a monomodal text, and answer simple comprehension
questions, with specific answers. In futuristic multiliteracies practice, students
need to be able to use their critical thinking abilities to develop their own
meaning (New London Group, 1996). This is an imperative skill for students to
learn in order to be successful in a new capitalistic society upon leaving
school. 

In order for students to be successful, they need to apply critical framing

skills in all aspects of their life, Biswas (2014) suggest that “different prospects
of critical framing are crucial for 21st century students to include their pleasure
and experience from family, friends, popular culture, social media, and
language in the process of making text. Teachers can encourage students to
notice and analyze practices of communicating meaningful ideas in schools
and communities.” (Biswas, 2014)

To create students who are ready for an unknown future, a multiliteracies

pedagogy needs to be in place, which supports, and engages students to
think critically, and independently, about what they are reading, and
interacting with. A media literacy curriculum, also needs to be in place in order
to help students navigate through information. Students should be asking
“why?” when engaging with multimodal texts, and using problem solving
strategies to search for answers. Through critical framing “students step back
from what they have learned, critique their learning, and extend and apply
their learning in new contexts.” (Angay-Crowder, Choi, & Yi, 2013, p. 38)
TRANSFORMED PRACTICE

Transformative practice, is where 21st century educators are able to see

students take their knowledge from situated practice, overt instruction,
and critical framing, and transform that knowledge through the design and
creation from one text to something new based on the meaning that they have
understood, created, and want to convey to an audience. It "involves students
putting the 'transformed meaning to work in other contexts' and in the process
adding something of themselves" (Kalantzis & Cope, 2001, p. 14)

Transformative practice, is arguably the most difficult, and most important

component of multiliteracies practice. It shows students understanding of
texts, and what it meant to them. Being able to create multimodal texts is also
one of the most important skills students will need to be successful outside of
school. We live in a society where the ability to work collaboratively in order to
create something is paramount. Angay-Crowder, et al. (2013) suggest that “a
certain degree of tension exists when students engage in transformed
practice, especially when they juxtapose and integrate diverse discourses and
remake their own realities or discourses to suit their needs and
purposes.” (Angay-Crowder, Choi, & Yi, 2013, p. 38)
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

Educators need to assist students through guidance, and allowing them to

weave in the other three components of multiliteracies pedagogy when
transforming their knowledge. When students get stuck, they need to know
that they can find pro-ams (Gee, 2009) in their communities of practice to get
situated knowledge. They need to be able to look back at the content, and
think about it critically, and they also will often require more overt instruction.
One of the benefits of project based learning is that students are engaged in
their creating, and are able to receive more one-to-one overt instruction, or
guidance.

The transformative process is part of the comprehension process, and

that through the use of technological tools and creating, students are not only
able to comprehend the texts that they have read, but they are also
comprehending the process in which they are learning. (Biswas, 2014). This
metacognition, is one of the most important skills for 21st century students
and beyond.

PREPARING FOR FUTURE LITEARCY

In order to successfully prepare 21st century students for an unknown
future, educators need to use the four components of multiliteracies
pedagogy outlined by the New London Group (1996), and incorporate the use
of technology, communities of practice, student’s identities, social media,
and digital tools, to project based learning situations.

Educators and society also need to stop seeing literacy as an individual,

monomodal, pen and paper task, but rather as a sharing process, in which
people learn by, and through collaboration, and dissemination of information,
through text, images, videos, and a plethora of other modalities afforded to us
by technology. Scribner (1984) suggests that functional literacy is being able
to participate “in the actual life conditions of particular groups or communities”
(p. 10). To be able to function in today's society, and into the future, students
need to be equipped with knowledge of technological tools.

The reason for modern schooling is to provide students with the

necessary skills, and knowledge to be successful in the future outside of
school. Futuristic teachers need to help students become life-long learners
who are ready, organized, and equipped for new capitalism (Gee, 1999).
Multiliteracies pedagogy takes that one step further, by focusing on issues
of social justice, so that students can become well-rounded problem solvers,
and global citizens, ready to take on the problems of the future.
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

In our fast paced, technology driven society, we engage in a wide range

of multimodal technologies. On order to be able to effectively participate with
these literacies, and in society, students need to be given the tools to
effectively mediate and make meaning of the multimodal texts they engage
with.

TOPIC 2: INTRODUCTION TO MULTIMODALITY

THE IMPORTANCE OF MULTIMODALITIES IN 21ST CENTURY

EDUCATION

Through the use of the internet, and several other digital technologies, society
is now able to create meaning in a multitude of ways, and in a variety of
different modes, from pictures, to videos, to texts, and hypertext. These
technologies have afforded us to share information with people and
communities across the globe in numerous platforms, in many diverse
modes. 

        People share through texts, images,

coding, photos, videos, infographics, and the modes in which we are able to
share are growing daily. While these multiple modes are still often paired with
text, teachers need to ensure that 21st century students are equipped with the
skills to comprehend multiple modes. With the vast amount of modalities,
literacy is no longer just reading and writing,  it’s designing,  inferring,
creating, deducting, analyzing, synthesizing, constructing meaning, and
questioning.

TECHNOLOGY

In looking at how technology assists students’ literacy learning, it is

important to first look at the multimodality of the internet, and the variety of
ways people use the different modes online concurrently to interact with
different communities of practice.

The study of multimodality (Street, Pahl, & Rowsell, 2010) shows how
multimodal texts use more than one semiotic mode for people to interact
within communicative practices.  Students needs to be literate in multiple
ways to navigate through the visual, textual, and technological information of
the 21st century in order to be able to fully understand each multimodal text,
provided to us by technology.http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
Luke (2000) suggests that “In hypertext navigations, reading, writing, and
communicating are not linear or unimodal, but demand a multimodal reading
of laterally connected multi-embedded and further hotlinked information
resources variously coded in animation, symbols, print text, photos, movie
clips, or three dimensional and manoeuvrable graphics.” (p. 73).

These ‘new literacies’ are based on a variety of text-symbol relationships,

and have a language that accompanies them.  Some of these ‘languages’ are
simple and used in a variety of online communities, such as keyboard
generated emoticons or smileys, while others have an individual language for
just one type of community.  For example, Twitter, (a social
networking website that allows its members to post short 140 character
messages and links to photos of videos) uses language like ‘tweets’,
‘hashtags’, ‘trending’ etc., specific to its community.  For those who are not
members of this community, this language or metalanguage, is likely foreign. 
Gee (2009) argues that “All language is meaningful only in and through the
contexts in which it is used…All language is ‘inexplicit’ until listeners and
readers fill it out on the basis of the experiences they have had and the
information they have gained in prior socioculturally significant interactions
with others.” (p. 31). Teachers need to provide students with opportunities to
engage with technology, in order to develop the metalanguages associated
with them. We not only need to instruct students how to use hardware, but
also online tools, applications, and internet navigation that work alongside the
physical technology.

Digital tools and technology, are assisting students by providing them with
more shared, social, literacy opportunities than ever before. Gee (2009)
further develops this idea in his discussion that literacy is learned based on
situated practices.  He (Gee, 2009) suggests that “situated meanings make
specialist language lucid, easy and useful.” (p. 31) and that digital mediums
“can be used to support learning and literacy.  The key to all of them is that
they situate meaning in words of experience –the stuff out of which the human
mind is made –experience that is ultimately shared, collaborative, social and
cultural” (p. 32).  http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

THE FLIPPED CLASSROOM

 
The flipped classroom, allows students to have 24/7 access to teaching
and learning materials through online (often video) instruction. While many
educators use the flipped classroom differently (Tucker, 2012), all of their
approaches involve engaging students through overt instruction at home, in
order for them to have more time to collaborate, share, design and create in
class. 

Jinlei et al. (2012) define the flipped classroom as “a classroom the swaps
the arrangement of knowledge imparting and knowledge internalization
comparing to the traditional classroom.” (Jinlei, Wang, & Baohui, 2012) In the
flipped classroom, teachers are in a better place to facilitate learning, and
students are afforded more one-to-one guidance and instruction from their
teacher, helping create a more collaborative space for learning, and creating.

Future students need to have the ability to work with more information,
and develop more skills than ever before. Through creating a flipped
classroom by providing students with videos, and shared lessons where
students can interact, the majority of the overt instruction has already been
learned at home; an environment where students can learn at their own pace,
and find answers to questions, by using digital tools. As a result of this, time at
schools can then be used to help students develop the skills they need to
think critically, problem solve, design and create. Through the use of this
teaching model “instruction can be rethought to best maximize the scarcest
learning resource—time” (Tucker, 2012). http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

VIDEO GAMES AND GAME-BASED EDUCATION

Videogames are arguably the most popular form of entertainment in the

21st century. Far too often children hear “those games are rotting your brain”
from parents who are worried about their child’s consumption of this modality.
You could argue that many young people are ‘addicted’ to video games.
Students are certainly spending more time in the 21st century playing video
games than they are reading novels. This is why educators need to see the
value in video games, as a way to educate and inform their students through
play, and realize that video games, are not just a form of entertainment,
(Jordan, 2011) bur an engaging educational tool.

Learning through games can lead to situated meanings, and specialist

language (Gee, 2004). Videogames fit the description of what multiliteracies
practice is all about; collaborative, social, multimodal learning. It could be
argued that videogames best fit  multiliteracies pedagogy, because users are
not only ‘reading’ text, videos, sounds, and images; they are also concurrently
problem solving, deducting, persuading, operating, and communicating. 

This tool of multiliteracies pedagogy is particularly interesting, because we

can see games both as a literacy, and as an educational tool for teaching. Not
only do teachers need to be teaching students through the use of
videogames, but we also need to teach students how to comprehend, design,
and create in this mode.

  While we see videos, images, and other modalities as texts, society still
often struggles to see videogames as a type of digital text, which is ironic, as
it fits all the criteria best. Jordan (2011) argues that “a key reason for adding
video games to the textual framework of English studies is because they are
texts, and as such are very much akin to the literature, argumentative writing,
and films currently in use in the English fields. Because video games are
texts, they can provide important insights into the nature of storytelling and the
activity of readers, both in enacting and interpreting the text and the literate
practices involved in doing so.” (Jordan, 2011, p. 17)

Not only do educators need to be teaching students that videogames are

a type of literacy, but teachers also need use them to help teach their
students about a variety of topics. Videogames engage students to set goals,
develop problem-solving strategies, and help cultivate their knowledge on
different types of information. http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

SOCIAL MEDIA

In the 21st century, people are members of a wealth of different

communities, both online and in person.  Society lives in a global community
driven by technology and sharing, and thus, people are now able to
communicate with communities of all types from all over the planet.  Barton &
Hamilton (2005) discuss how, “social practices differ greatly across …[a]
diversity of contexts and social interactions (p. 8).  Such structures have
advanced based on space, time, technology and expectations.   The
emergence of multifaceted, intermingled human relations has also impacted
literacy learning.  Individuals interact in a diverse range of settings, impacting
human relations and social exchange.  

Technology is changing the nature of how information is shared.  Gee

(2009) suggests that “Prior to our current digital tools, it was hard to start and
sustain a group.  It usually required an institution... Today, with things like
Flicker, My Space, Facebook, and digital devices like mobile phones, it is
easier than ever to form and join groups.” (p. 12).  Social networking is
changing the way that people work, collaborate, and share information. 
Different social networks often have a level of literacy of their own.  They are
a tool for sharing information, videos, thoughts, crafts, views, photos, etc.

Social networks also disseminate information with a multiliteracies

approach through the fact that they, like literacy, are social. They use a variety
of multimodal texts that members can actively engage with.  When
considering digital texts, Street et al. (2010) analyzes Facebook in order to
“see a merging of materiality and modal compositions through photographs
and signage, with communities, cultural practices, and everyday life through
rituals such as adding comments to your wall space.  Using cultural practices
like uploading images to complement texts…[these] represent concrete
examples of merging semiosis with social practice” (p. 2000).  People are
constantly involved in the literacy practice of sharing, collaborating, and
disseminating information in a multitude of ways.  Social networks bring
communities closer to us, and assist us in learning, or gaining the necessary
knowledge that can be used across many communities of practice (Gee,
2009).  It is important to look at how these ideas are shared and in what
format, which leads to research on identity studies to see how information is
shared differently based on our sense of self.
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

          New Literacy Studies argues that one of the fundamental principles of
learning is shared social experiences. To fully prepare students for “new
capitalism” (Gee, 1999), educators and policy makers need to design, develop
and implement structures that incorporate this sharing of information through
social experiences.  Through the use of overt instruction, situated practice,
and critical framing, educators need to introduce, immerse, and let students
design and create their own meaning, and be able to transfer that meaning to
a variety of contexts. One of the best ways for students to interact in the 21st
century and beyond is through social networking sites and applications.

SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS

WIKIS
Social media, and online writing are an amazing platform for both
teachers and students to educate, solve problems, interact, and assess
knowledge. Through websites like wikis, teachers are able to post information
for students, see creative design projects that students have created, and
assess and provide support and feedback for learners.

    Cope et al. (2011) propose that "teachers and students are increasingly
using Web-based writing portfolio spaces such as Wikispaces, PBWiki,
WordPress, and Google Apps. These spaces become living, Web-accessible,
and assessable records of learning tasks that students have undertaken
(Cope, Kalantzis, McCarthey, Vojak, & Kline, 2011, p. 80).

TWITTER
Vasudevan et al, (2013), describe Twitter as “a microblogging platform
that challenges the user to condense his or her thoughts into 140-character
messages called tweets that, when published, appear automatically in the
newsfeeds of those who have subscribed to—or follow—the user’s channel”
(Vasudevan et al, 2013, p455). http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

      Twitter is an excellent example of a platform that promotes the idea that

literacy is social (Scribner, 1984). Through the act of tweeting, students are
able to engage with multiliteracies, and traditional text, by attaching photos,
images, links, and videos. Through the audience of online members, students
are able to create and build their identities, further engaging them in 21st
century literacy practice.

FACEBOOK
Facebook is a popular online social networking platform where students
disseminate information through a variety of modes. When considering digital
texts, Street et al. (2010) analyzes Facebook in order to “see a merging of
materiality and modal compositions through photographs and signage, with
communities, cultural practices, and everyday life through rituals such as
adding comments to your wall space.  Using cultural practices like uploading
images to complement texts…[these] represent concrete examples of
merging semiosis with social practice” (p. 2000). Through the mass of
modalities shared on Facebook, it proves to be an excellent tool for future
multiliteracies practice.

Like any tool however, educators need to make sure that they monitor and
create meaningful learning opportunities, in order for the platform to be a
successful educational tool. As facebook is an online sharing environment,
Selwyn (2009) suggests that “Facebook appears to provide a ready space
where the ‘role conflict’ that students often experience in their relationships
with…teaching staff, academic conventions and expectations can be worked
through in a relatively closed ‘backstage’ area (p. 157).
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

IDENTITY AND DIGITAL CITIZENSHIP

As literacy is a social process, educators need to look at how identity
affects student literacy and build on that positively. Multiliteracies pedagogy
builds on the influence that technology has on identity, and helps students
think critically think about the identities that they create both online and
through their work in the classroom. Angay-Crowder et al. (2013) suggest that
through the use the four components of multiliteracies (New London Group,
1996) that this pedagogy can “develop students’ leadership skills as they work
as a team, set goals, manage time and resources, and construct a positive
identity.” (Angay-Crowder, Choi, & Yi, 2013, p. 44) 

Students today often have multiple online identities based on different

social networking platforms. Many of them have an awareness of how their
posts effect their identity. They use different platforms to post in different
modes, in order to develop the identity that they desire, based on the specific
audience of each platform. What is ideal, is that these identity based social
media outlets promote multimodal reading and writing. Moje et al. (2009)
argue young people “wrote for multiple reasons, namely because their literacy
acts were situated in social networks and because they stood to gain social
and cultural capital by reading and writing” (Moje, Luke, Davies, & Street,
2009, p. 21).http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

By interacting, designing, creating, and posting on social media, students

are allowed the opportunity to think metacognatively about their own identity,
and how they want to be perceived. Cope et al. (2011) argue that “learning is
also integrally related to learner identity—you don’t learn unless you feel you
belong in a learning context where you know you can act as a knowledge
maker and that your action will work and be seen to work by your
fellows” (Cope, Kalantzis, McCarthey, Vojak, & Kline, 2011, p. 83).

Identifying, and capitalizing on students’ identities, is an essential skill for

21st century teachers to be able to engage students in their learning. By
planning projects, activities, and learning models that focus on students
identity, and identity creation, 21st century teachers will be more able to
activate students learning potential. 

TECHNOLOGICAL TOOLS

In order for future success, students need access to suitably intended

digital environments with accessible technology. Such an environment
changes the way educators teach, expands social interaction, and surges
motivation and learning (Earle, 2002). It is important to point out that
technology itself will not necessarily encourage this growth. The way
technology is integrated into teaching practice through situated practice, overt
instruction, critical framing, and transformed practice (New London Group,
1996) is what makes the tool effective for future learners.  Borsheim et al.
(2008) suggest that “we should…choose to integrate technology in
pedagogically thoughtful ways. Going beyond technology for technology’s
sake can extend and deepen the many pedagogical goals teaching in the
twenty-first century demands. (Borsheim, Merritt, & Reed, 2008, p. 90).

Technology has come a long way over the years and is constantly
developing. What is different for 21st century educators, is that technology
now, is no longer just physical hardware, like the overhead projector, or the
typewriter, it involves a knowledge of the software and programs that
computers, tablets, and other digital technologies provide. As a result of this,
technology goes beyond having just one use. Effective educators need to
teach students the multiple uses of these tools, and how they are not just
used to receive information, but how they can be used to create, design, and
solve problems. (Earl, 2002)http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

These technologies allow students and educators to gain new

instructional capabilities and learning experiences that “promote deep
processing of ideas; increase student interaction with subject matter; promote
faculty and student enthusiasm for teaching and learning; and free up time for
quality classroom interaction”  (Earle, 2002, p. 6). Teachers, do not just need
to promote the use of technology to engage their students, but use these tools
to assist their digital literacy, and comprehension of multimodal texts. This is a
key skill of future success outside of school. By allowing students to access
technology, teachers are assisting their ability to read, research, evaluate, and
sort information in a collaborative, problem-solving environment. Students
also need to be able to publish multimodal texts in a variety of different ways
for diverse or specific audiences. “Teachers committed to a multiliteracies
pedagogy help students understand how to move between and across various
modes and media as well as when and why they might draw on specific
technologies to achieve specific purposes” (Borsheim, Merritt, & Reed, 2008,
p. 87).

By using technology effectively in the classroom, we are able to still teach

all of the same basic curriculum skills of literacy, but that technology allows us
to improve on how we do that (Borsheim, Merritt, & Reed, 2008). Borsheim et
al (2008), argue that “the multiliteracies approach helps students learn to be
savvier users and organizers of online resources, use technologies to
facilitate revision and collaboration throughout the writing process, and use
technologies to achieve authentic goals and reach real audiences for their
research” (Borsheim, Merritt, & Reed, 2008, p. 88).

It is paramount that technology is integrated into all classrooms, and

equally important that teachers develop a multiliteracies pedagogy of how to
use it effectively. Through multimodal, collaborative project based learning,
teachers are able to use technology as a tool to teach, as well as a tool for
students to transform their knowledge.http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
Topic 3. MULTIMODAL LITERACIES IN INSTRUCTION
With extraordinary advances in technology and a growing emphasis on
creation and innovation, the educational needs of 21st-century learners are
constantly evolving. As a result, traditional definitions of reading, writing, and
communication are being redefined to include new multimodal literacies.
Pedagogical practices are being reinvented as well as reimagined to best
support students’ rapidly changing needs. Teacher education programs play a
critical role in preparing preservice teachers with the knowledge, skills, and
experience needed to integrate these new literacies and digital technologies
into instruction.
In order to support students’ ongoing literacy needs, teacher educator
programs must create contexts and learning spaces that enable preservice
teachers to examine their beliefs regarding use of technology in teaching.
Though programs often strive to connect technology and curricular content in
practice, they are often challenged to develop instructional pedagogies
employing new literacies that can adapt as quickly as technology changes.
Programs face numerous barriers to effective preparation in the area of
multimodal literacy.

Many preservice teachers enter education programs with deeply held

belief systems regarding uses of technology in literacy instruction following
their many years as students of conventional teaching practices. Often
viewing literacy as a print-bound process, preservice teachers exhibit
reluctance in using technology for educational purposes and formal teaching
practices. Understanding the predictive powers of self-efficacy and positive
attitudes toward technology, programs commonly create stand-alone
technology integration courses that model use of multimodal formats and
authentic, hands-on learning experiences. Though these courses are
designed to show construction of knowledge in the area of technology
integration, they are often presented in isolation, unable to demonstrate the
importance of incorporation of practice across the curriculum and throughout
content areas.

Programs can work to bridge the gap between knowledge and instruction in
the area of multimodal literacy and integration of digital technologies. By
infusing innovative practices that prioritize exploration of an increasingly
textual world across all areas of coursework, teacher education programs can
prepare preservice teachers to inspire inquiry and transform learning in their
future classrooms.

The following ideas are offered as shifts of practice that teacher education
programs can consider in preparing pre-service teachers to integrate
multimodal literacies into instruction. http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
Provide distributed practice

Programs that extend learning past stand-alone technology courses can

demonstrate the transformative power of new literacies in learning. By offering
meaningful practice with digital technologies throughout all courses of study,
teacher education programs provide authentic modeling of multimodal literacy
integration across the curriculum. Preservice teachers can be empowered to
explore and design their own paths to understanding across contexts and
connected experiences. Offered as standards of practice, these infused
methodologies have the potential to extend and enhance the learning of
preservice teachers and also can serve as frameworks for instruction in their
classrooms of the future.

Design collaborative learning spaces

Learning space design can act as a catalyst to support sustainable change in

teaching and learning. By reexamining the landscape of the classroom and
methods of instruction, teachers education programs can promote
engagement and afford opportunities of networked collaboration. New
pedagogies focused on student-centered practices and active participation
evolve the role of the teacher from distant lecturer to facilitator of learning.
Shifting roles of teachers and students can allow everyone to be a part of the
exchange of ideas and sharing of knowledge. Together in a technology-
supported learning space, everyone can explore as curators and composers
of multimodal literacies.

Focus on the verbs

Teacher education programs seeking to prepare preservice teachers for

classrooms of the future can positively affect practice by shifting focus from
the ever-changing “nouns” of education to the actionable “verbs” of discovery.
Empowering students to engage and create and connect and explore can
guide real-time instructional decision making in selection of materials and
methodologies. Interest-driven projects that prioritize student voice, creativity,
and choice of delivery can allow preservice teachers to connect theory to
practice in powerful and personalized ways.

Encourage inquiry and investigate the world

By asking students to seek solutions to problems of global significance,

teacher education programs can encourage preservice teachers to engage in
deep learning through a process of inquiry and investigation. Meaningful
topics with profound disciplinary and interdisciplinary bases can provide
opportunities for students to think critically. Preservice teachers can use
multimodal literacies to examine problems, gather information, and
communicate decisions. Through this process of inquiry, preservice teachers
can employ digital technologies and move along a continuum of technology
integration. The creation of digital artifacts can offer transparency of
perspectives and sharing of solutions, and the learning can inspire change
that is relevant and significant.http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

Support self-efficacy through reflection

Dedication of time and thought for discussion can place focus on

metacognitive thinking and reflection. Teacher education programs can
promote self-efficacy of preservice teachers by encouraging innovation,
inspiring curiosity, and providing safe opportunities for taking risks through
exploration of ideas. Preservice teachers can be invited to explore together
deeply held belief systems and discover ways to weave multimodal literacies
into practice to enhance learning and expression of perspectives. Together,
teacher education programs and preservice teachers can redefine
instructional practices to inspire collective change on their quests to make a
difference in classrooms of today and of the future.

Modes
The following overview of how meaning can be composed through
different semiotic resources for each mode (spoken language, written
language, visual, audio, gestural, and spatial) is informed by The New London
Group (2000), Cope and Kalantzis, (2009), and Kalantzis, Cope, Chan, and
Dalley-Trim (2016). EAL/D learners engage with all of these meaning making
practices through multicultural and/or multilingual lens.

Currently, there is extensive pedagogic support for teaching meaning making

through spoken and written language, and some resources developed to
support teaching meaning making in the visual mode, through ‘viewing’.
However, as yet there are few resources available for teaching young
students how to comprehend and compose meaning in the other modes. 

Written Meaning

Conveyed through written language via handwriting, the printed page, and the
screen. Choices of words, phrases, and sentences are organised through
linguistic grammar conventions, register (where language is varied according
to context), and genre (knowledge of how a text type is organised and staged
to meet a specific purpose).

In bilingual or multilingual texts, written meaning may be conveyed

through different scripts and laid out differently, whether typed or handwritten.
EAL/D learners may also write words from their home languages using
English letters (transliteration).

Spoken (oral) meaning

Conveyed through spoken language via live or recorded speech and can
be monologic or dialogic. Choice of words, phrases, and sentences are
organised through linguistic grammar conventions, register, and genre.
Composing oral meaning includes choices around mood, emotion, emphasis,
fluency, speed, volume, tempo, pitch, rhythm, pronunciation, intonation, and
dialect. EAL/D learners may make additional choices around the use of home
languages to create mood or emphasise meaning. See: Speaking and
listening pedagogic resources. http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/

Visual Meaning

Conveyed through choices of visual resources and includes both still image
and moving images. Images may include diverse cultural connotations,
symbolism and portray different people, cultures and practices. Visual
resources include: framing, vectors, symbols, perspective, gaze, point of view,
colour, texture, line, shape, casting, saliency, distance, angles, form, power,
involvement/detachment, contrast, lighting, naturalistic/non-naturalistic,
camera movement, and subject movement.

Audio Meaning

Conveyed through sound, including choices of music representing different

cultures, ambient sounds, noises, alerts, silence, natural/unnatural sounds,
and use of volume, beat, tempo, pitch, and rhythm. Lyrics in a song may also
include multiple languages.

Spatial Meaning

Conveyed through design of spaces, using choices of spatial resources

including: scale, proximity, boundaries, direction, layout, and organisation of
objects in the space. Space extends from design of the page in a book, a
page in a graphic novel or comic, a webpage on the screen, framing of shots
in moving image, to the design of a room, architecture, streetscapes, and
landscapes.

Gestural Meaning

Conveyed through choices of body movement; facial expression, eye

movements and gaze, demeanour, gait, dance, acting, action sequences. It
also includes use of rhythm, speed, stillness and angles, including ‘timing,
frequency, ceremony and ritual’ (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009. p. 362). Gestures
and body language may have diverse cultural connotations.

Types of Multimodal Texts

Multimodality does not necessarily mean use of technology, and
multimodal texts can be paper-based, live, or digital. 

Paper-based Multimodal Texts include picture books, text books, graphic

novels, comics, and posters. http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
Live Multimodal Texts, for example, dance, performance, and oral
storytelling, convey meaning through combinations of various modes such as
gestural, spatial, audio, and oral language. 

Digital Multimodal Texts include film, animation, slide shows, e-posters,

digital stories, podcasts, and web pages that may include hyperlinks to
external pronunciation guides or translations.

SUMMARY

Traditional ways of teaching, such as one reading for the entire class, no
longer hold the same relevance in today’s classrooms as they did in the past. 
Students bring diverse backgrounds to the classroom while having a variety of
media inputs at the disposal.  How then do teachers keep up with student
interests in an effort to increase levels of achievement while still holding true
to learning outcomes prescribed by the Ministry of Education here in Ontario?
Multiliteracy pedagogy may be an answer to this question.

Multiliteracy pedagogy is designed to engage the learner through focusing

on their background and interests and better prepares them to deal with the
intricacies of the world.  At the heart of multiliteracy pedagogy are four key
terms: situated practice, over instruction, critical framing, and transformed
practice.  These four components of multliteracy pedagogy stem from the
New London Group’s work in the late 1990s on redesigning how educators
view literacy in the classroom.

The basis for each component is as follows (adapted from the work of the
New London Group, 1996).

Situated Practice: Engaging learners in meaningful, authentic

lessons/projects that incorporate one’s community and background.

Overt Instruction: Teaching in the moment to better guide the student

towards success.

Critical Framing: Looking at any given message from another perspective to

recognize its value on multiple levels.

Transformed Practice: Taking one’s understanding and placing it another

context.  In essence, a juxtaposition of understanding.

The ability to read and write in monomodal text formats is no longer

enough to be literate in the 21st century and into the future. In order for
student to become multiliterate, they need to be instructed on how to engage,
interact, and understand how multimodal texts convey and produce meaning.
Educators need to deliver a pedagogy that provides students with the skills to
be self-reliant critical thinkers and communicators in a society that demands
this kind of literacy.

Future educators need to be confident in their ability to promote this type

of learning through multiple modes in order to create a classroom
environment where students can effectively create, learn and think critically
about the media and modalities that they are using, in order to create a
society that will be able to function in the future.

Educators and policy makers needs to move away from creating ‘robots’
or rote learning, and build a community of thinkers, and collaborative problem
solvers. Students should not be busy focusing on remembering answers, but
rather on the ability to access answers through technology, and be able to
discuss and think critically about them.

Students are no longer confound by the four walls of the classroom.

Through the integration of a multiliteracies pedagogy, students learn how to
engage with the world, and the global community that they are very much a
part of. They need to learn how to collaborate, and work with others to create,
design, and perhaps most importantly, solve problems.

Multiliteracies pedagogy has exploded a necessary shift in culture that

allows teachers, and others in the educational field, to look at the way that we
are educating students for tomorrow, and rethink educational and curriculum
practice. Students need to discover and inquire with guidance, in order to
make their own meaning, through the use of technological tools. They need to
be active citizens in their learning communities and beyond. 

Through the use of multiliteracies pedagogy with the incorporation of:

multimodalites, the four components of multiliteracies pedagogy (New London
Group, 1996), technology, identity integration, new digital formative
assessment pedagogy, and media and digital literacy, students in the 21st
century will be able to be actively prepared for an unknown future.

Teaching and Learning Activities

Answer the question below. Give relevant examples to support your answer.
1. What are your understandings of multiliteracies pedagogy?
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2. How do you apply your understanding of and experiences with
multiliteracies in your classroom teaching?
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3. How do you make sense of your experiences with multiliteracies in your
classroom?
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Answer the question below. Give relevant examples to support your answer.

4. Why teaching multimodal literacy is important?

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6. Recommended learning materials and resources for supplementary

reading.
Gail E. Tompkins Literacy for the 21st Century 2018: A Balanced Approach
(pages 4-33)
Note: This e-book is uploaded in our Google Classroom (Class Code:
dqubqxy)for your ready reference.
http://93.174.95.29/main/8BDC8A7C9EC085FBAC7C9846CE00DFA8
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/
http://futuristicmultiliteracies.weebly.com/main-components-of-
multiliteracies-pedagogy.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejQiJmA5dQQ&feature=emb_title
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJJkkUPC_yM
https://prezi.com/9esalgqaihgo/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=458XBWakDlc
https://youtu.be/jL2BXO1B3-w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reLFdbjZYDI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYtSgJ0enpU
https://www.literacyworldwide.org/blog/literacy-now/2015/07/22/five-shifts-
of-practice-multimodal-literacies-in-instruction

Flexible Teaching Learning Modality (FTLM) adopted

Online (synchronous) Google classroom Class Code dqubqxy

Remote (asynchronous) A Self-paced Learning Module 1 Introduction to
21st Century Literacies uploaded also in Google Classroom for ready
reference and printing.
Assessment Task
Quiz 2. Answer the question below. Give relevant examples to support your
answer.
1. Compare and contrast the components of multiliteracy pedagogy.
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2. Why teaching multimodal literacy is important? And How multimodal

literacy support instruction?
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9. References
Elen Joy Alata and Eigen John Ignacio 2019 1 st Edition: Building and
Enhancing New Literacies Across the Curriculum, 1st Edition Rex
Bookstore
Gail E. Tompkins Literacy for the 21st Century 2018: A Balanced Approach:
Pearson
Bill Cope, Mary Kalantzis 2015 (eds.) A PEDAGOGY OF MULTILITERACIES:
LEARNING BY DESIGN Palgrave Macmillan UK, Year
Angay-Crowder, T., Choi, J., & Yi, Y. (2013, Spring). Putting Multiliteracies Into
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Barton, D., & Hamilton, M. (2005). Literacy, reification and the dynamics of
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Biswas, S. (2014). How to Teach Multiliteracies. The Canadian Journal For

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Borsheim, C., Merritt, K., & Reed, D. (2008). Beyond Technology for
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Buckhingham, C. (2009). M-learning: texting (SMS) as a teaching & learning

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Bull, G., & Anstey, M. (2007). What’s so different about

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Carrington, V., & Robinson, M. (2009). Digital Literacies: Social Learning and

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All info-graphics are borrowed from google images. Please contact me for
sources
All youtube videos can be found at their respective links