Using new literacies theory as a lens for analyzing technology-mediated literacy classrooms

Abstract

In this article, I share the ways in which New Literacies theory served as an interpretive lens to understand how the Internet as a cultural tool mediates the literacy actions of adolescents in English Language Arts classrooms. Data were drawn from a larger study in which students who were considered “at-risk” because of previous academic failure were given the opportunity to engage in digital writing events by classroom teachers who used digital writing frequently and in a variety of different ways in their instruction, ranging from collaborative writing using Google Docs to the use of Web 2.0 applications and multimodal projects. Findings revealed that writing with technology tools both enabled and constrained the literacy actions of the adolescent participants. Analyzing the learning context of these fourth and ninth grade classrooms through the lens of New Literacies theory informed my understanding of the ways in which technology infused the literacy curriculum and daily literacy practices that occurred in the literacy classrooms.

Students’ discursive moves in two distinct literacy modes: Comparing approaches in a grade 10 English classroom

“…At the time of this study, I had seven years of experience as a high school English teacher and believe that teachers play a critical role in creating student learning contexts (Feuerstein et al., 2002; West, 2019). To somewhat reduce my impact on students’ linguistic practices, I was not an active participant in the backchannel chat (cf.…”

“…Students' liberal and unprompted usage of the @ sign to directly address another user might explain the lack of second-person pronouns. Considering that new literacies lead to new social practices and deitic language use (West, 2019), the @ sign replaced the pronoun "you. "…”

Aligning assessment, technology, and multi-literacies

“…Thus, writing when incorporated into multimodal texts has to be understood differently from when it participates in print text alone. As West (2019) argues, writing in digital contexts has the potential to differ significantly from the traditional pen and paper contexts in that digital texts are shared with audiences who may further alter the text. This article therefore argues that courses need to be designed to include student learning about visual design of texts including the use of color, fonts, image placement, and size (Kalantzis et al., 2010; Kress, 2003; Leu et al., 2017), as well as the need for students to learn about the interpretation of multimodal texts and how sharing text can lead to altering, remixing or co-creation.…”

“…The written modes of meaning now combine with visual, aural, gestural, and spatial patterns of meaning. To be successfully managed as part of a multimodal text, writing has to be understood differently from when it is in print text and Bezemer and Kress (2008), Bowen (2017), and West (2019) contend that the digital image is in fact replacing writing as the central mode for representation. They describe how the skills of reading images differ greatly to reading text that goes from left to right and top to bottom, while the image does not have such an order.…”

“…Essays must be separate, the blogs must be assessed for how the tool is used to make information interesting, elicit feedback and provide continuity.” This challenged the authors to reexamine their own pedagogical approach to course design so that technology and its associated multimodal literacies could be included in the assessment process. The term multimodal refers to the modes that create meaning, such as visual, audio, linguistic, spatial, and gestural (West, 2019). This article examines the complex nature of design to include multimodal aspects and argues for assessment that has constructive alignment (Biggs, 2003) which sets out the interdependence of learning outcomes, teaching, and assessment with ideally, all three aligned as equal partners.…”