Presentation by: Harini Rajagopal, Sophie Sadri
Session: E | Time: 11:05AM – 11:45AM | Location: Room 206
Numerous scholars (see for example, Cummins & Early, 2011) highlight the importance of designing learning environments that accommodate critical engagement with student interests and identities by using the affordances of multimodality (Jewitt, 2008; Kress & van Leeuwen, 2001). Although research demonstrates that children are able to communicate powerful and imaginative ideas and problems through a variety of symbol systems (Mitchell, 2011; Weber & Mitchell, 1995; Wetton & McWhirter, 1998), in most instances, these alternative modes of representation remain undervalued in schools in general, and particularly in language and literacy education classes (Stein, 2003; Zammitt, 2011). At the same time, B.C.’s Redesigned Curriculum (“B.C.’s Redesigned Curriculum”, 2015) encourages teachers to interact with the multimodal complexity of learning and communication and encourages students to engage with their abilities to learn in new and interactive ways.
Keeping these issues in mind, we (Sophie, a Grade 2/3 classroom teacher in the Vancouver School Board, and Harini, a PhD candidate in education at UBC) worked collaboratively to bridge research with practice. In this presentation, we will discuss a modified Photovoice project (Palibroda, Krieg, Murdock, & Havelock, 2009; Wang & Burris, 1997) that we collaborated on with the children. We use this project to illustrate some experiences – both positive and challenging – of what becomes possible when we no longer privilege only traditional written language as part of the learning experience. We will also briefly discuss our different perspectives, as a teacher and a researcher (and report on some student perspectives), on the process of this collaborative project. If we are to take seriously the need to align approaches to teaching and learning with research that focuses on valuing an individual child’s strengths and styles of representation, we need to reflect on the types of valuing that happens in a classroom setting while acknowledging the various systems that complicate the learning environment.
Abstract: 576