Multiliteracies

Multiliteracies refer to an approach to literacy and pedagogy which highlights two key aspects of literacy: linguistic diversity and multimodal forms of linguistic expressions and representation.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiliteracy

Multiliteracies refers to two major aspects of language use today, namely (i) the variability of making meaning, e.g. different cultural context, social context and domain specific context (ii) multimodality of making meaning in digital information and communication media.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JNrQnI7oUk

The following improve student’s learning:

Multimedia- When there is an integration of words and pictures when delivering content.
Spatial contiguity-Presentation of pictures with words together on the same level to enhance understanding.
Temporal contiguity–A simultaneous presentation of images and texts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUZLhiOfA54

Students learn differently, hence the educational platforms must encourage students to make use of all available resources that includes among others; audios, videos, graphs, pictures, text etc.

In the article below, Taylor (2014) implies that language alone cannot operate as the dominant mode but a variety of generic features of all modes can be used for making meaning of different concepts. It is furthermore emphasised that students communicate and learn through all available semiotic resources.

Taylor, R. 2014. Meaning between, in and around words, gestures and postures – multimodal meaning-making in children's classroom discourse. Language and Education, 28 (5):401-420, DOI: 10.1080/09500782.2014.885038 or https://doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2014.885038

A teacher can ask students to summarise a text by making all of all resources of multimodal learning in their summaries. In this task, students can use Mindjet manager to draw up their mind maps in order to summarise the text or make use of a poster or a word document to present their summaries. They can also make use of PowerPoint presentation to present their summaries. This will depend on what direction they would like to take in order to present the summary of the text. In addition, they can add references and videos if need be. The idea here is that students are more flexible to create a summary in order to showcase their abilities with regard to the content knowledge and understanding of the topic.