«Meaning-making is a process of representation (sense-making) and communication (in which a message prompt is interpreted by another person). This update analyses the design process through which people take available resources for meaning, and use these as building blocks for designing new meanings. Although they are often similar, newly made meanings are never quite the same as any previous meanings. These ‘redesigned’ meanings then enter the world. At this point the world has been transformed, even if in the smallest of ways. Then the cycle of meaning-making can start over again. Even though in the schools of our recent past and still today we have separated out literacies as a singular subject that deals with the mechanics of reading and writing, our processes of meaning are always at least to some extent multimodal, bringing together written, visual, spatial, tactile, gestural, audio and oral modes. This is particularly true in the contemporary era. The new, digital media are intrinsically multimodal. »

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Synaesthesia - association among different senses - transferring meaning from one mode to another.

 

Prompt for discussion: «Describe an important site of multimodal communication in your life, or your students lives. How might a multimodal analysis of meaning prove useful? How does this compare with traditional notions of literacy?»

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My posts:

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Post 1

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Old times

I’m a senior and the days of my primary and secondary school are gone (thankfully) and many more opportunities and access to different modes of learning and learning materials are available at present. Unfortunatelly, traditional ways take too long to disappear, and the affordances of technology and cooperative learning pedagogies are not mainstream.

In my old days the schoolbook was «unique» per subject and lasted long, I’ve learned from books of my older brother and we have 9 years of difference.

 In my years of university students would buy printed material of teachers at the university and for my course of literature, foreign books had to be ordered from abroad, at the bookshop,  and it might take one month to arrive. Books were very expensive and so libraries were very important  to lend books for a period to study (eventually to copy).

The three basic literacies were read, write and count and the main tool for learning was the book and the teacher. The interaction with other materials was rare. Memory and reproduction were highly valued in the old fascist regime.

No differentiation was made among students  or any special help provided, the teacher  would teach for the« average  student» and those who weren’t able to catch up would fail and repeat more of the same in the following year.

I hated school, though I’ve adapted and never had to repeat the same grade. I was an average student with many obstacles along the way.

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Post 2

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Though many theories, methods  and practices centered on the student have existed up today, such as the french modern school of Freinet, or the spanish modern school of Ferrer Guardia, or other free schools like Summerhill, the fact is that those approaches are politically dangerous, the mainstream school  is guided towards conformity (Chomsky - https://youtu.be/DdNAUJWJN08) and turning people autonomous, creative and thinking on their own may be inconvenient, even for the «so-called» neoliberal democracies. Paulo Freire spoke of «banking teaching»  and his followers of critical pedagogy honoured his humanist approach (Giroux- https://youtu.be/UvCs6XkT3-o ).

The diagram presented in the vídeos of this course on the different modes of meaning and how we apprehend and learn relates to  the multiple intelligence theory of Howard Gardner (https://youtu.be/l2QtSbP4FRg ). We all are different and may have predispositions to learn in different modes and with different media. We have also to think of those who have certain limitations and really need adapted approaches, for a deaf person a gestural meaning is crucial, for a blind/low vision an audio médium is a must as well as a tactile to read Braille, for those with severe communication limitations visual aids can make all the difference.

The UDL approach is another interesting framework to deal with the diversity and respect all needs - http://www.udlcenter.org/-

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Post 3

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The digital tools available at present for free are amazing. One of my favourite repositories is - http://cooltoolsforschools.wikispaces.com/ - http://coolappsforschools.wikispaces.com/home . Unfortunatelly Wikispaces is going to close soon.

As I work in the field of special needs my concern has been with accessibility tools and assistive technology. I have build a repository of free tools in portuguese to support the community of SEN teachers - https://freewareneesite.wordpress.com/ and there are repositories in english - https://freewareneesite.wordpress.com/repositorios/

The UDL website has also an interesting tool that incorporates a narrator to help reading, (i.e dyslexia) - http://bookbuilder.cast.org/  .

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Post 4

Replying to a peer's post 

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It's always a risk to generalise situations, but I suppose that the most traditional teaching practices still reside in higher education, where the status of professors are ranked in a higher pedestal and the usual lecture prevails.

In fact the most interesting collaborative practices seem to occur in pre-school and primary school where cross curricular activities are natural.

In later grades where the division of subjects run by specialized teachers turns learning much more fragmented and disconnected from each other. The organization of time and space at school doesn't help more interrelation and holistic approaches to the different areas of knowledge. In spite of all the initiatives that take place in schools in what respects transdisciplinary projects, they remain sporadic projects not the current practice.

What I like about the modern school pedagogy is that students are not divided by ages or grades in the rigid way the mainstream school is. They don't have bells ringing every hour to change subjects.

The students are part of the designing of their own learning objectives, they develop self-assessment and a critical view of their accomplishments. Whether they have attained the objectives within the timing they have stipulated with the tutor or if they need more time to do it. They learn together in small groups, in big rooms. They can get help from older peers who have already passed that stage.

Another feature I like is how they resolve their issues (disciplinary or other) voting rules in general assemblies. These schools develop a democratic practice that allows a much more respectful social interaction, they hardly have the disciplinary and delinquicy that occur in other mainstream schools. The role of the teacher is less predominant, teachers are much more guides on the side. Pédagogie Freinet - https://youtu.be/bwSfuO_4AwY

Unfortunatelly these schools are usually outside the public system. In France there are a few in the public system, in Portugal we have only one school within the public system. It's unbelieveable why this pedagogy has not spread as it should.

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Post 5

Replying to a peer's post

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Other pedagogies centered on the student have paved the way like the Montessory, which is focused on pre-school and primary school, based on the interaction with didactic materials that Montessori created and have been adapted through the years and used at schools and at home.

She was the first doctor woman in Italy and she started developing her method owing to a first experience with institutionalized children with special needs in a psychiatric ward.

Another interesting italian initiative with pre-schools is Reggio Children, led by a teacher (Malaguzzi) after WWII and adopted by the municipality of Reggio-Emilia- http://www.reggiochildren.it/identita/?lang=en . The initiative has spread to other Continents. Malaguzzi stated the children had a hundred languages - https://reggioemilia2015.weebly.com/the-100-languages.html - it sounds like a poem, an anthem.

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