William Cope
Nithin Kalorth
Jako Olivier
Ida Brandão
Mitchell PetersMultimodal Literacies MOOC’s Updates
Essential Peer Reviewed Update #1
Make an update of 300 words or more: 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?
I am 74 years old, spent most of my school times until university in Japan, then I worked both in Sweden and in Japan since 1972. When I recall my life, there are some turning points when it comes to multimodal communication.
1) around 1968 I took a course of "Basic", a computer language developed at the Dartmouth College there I studied one year. Shocking experience then to learn that we can exactly order computers what and how the process should be done.
2) around 1988 I began using internet, browsing websites, emailing etc. I remember it was still connection via telephone lines but a completely new world and possibility opened up where one can have contacts and information without calling, writing letters or fax.
3) around 2003 Skype was released and synchronous video communication became possible without any fees.
4) Then came Covid-19 crisis in 2020 that accelerated digital revolution forcing everybody to work and study remotely. All of sudden digital communications became standard.
I have been teaching at a university in Japan between 1988 and 2013. During this period all the classes were face to face and no online classed took place. Of course I used information from internet in the classroom, could have synchronous video communications with peers and experts from outside the campus.
Since I retired in 2013, I have been carrying out face to face workshops to promote creativity. Then since 2019, I tried online workshop that just jumped up since Corona pandemics. https://prezi.com/view/SWrV43gaTiGrwhDaQs7B/
Online workshops are really challenging for me and for my participants. The model below is so useful to design the coming workshops to make them more multimodal.
Use of new technology is also challenging. I find for example MIRO so useful for cocreations and using in all workshops.
The other challenge for me is to create a safe learning community and discussion forum for participants where multimodal literacy can be fully utilized.
Very interesting because I learned BASIC as my first computer language when I was 15 in 1984 on my ADAM computer from Coleco. Since then I've been involved in the changes in technology. While completing my computer science degree in 2012 I was astounded by the quantum leap in technology like youTube and Facebook as well as cell phones. It was impossible to even be in a class without being able to text and call
my classmates on the spot.
You also brought up how Covid-19 brought about the at-home revolution which I really didn't think about until this moment. The word Zoom is taking it's place as a general word for synchronous video meetings like Kleenex defines facial tissues, or Photoshop defines digital photo manipulation. Well said.
Looking at how fast our ways have changed and how fast the information circulated which we must immediately respond to during this Digital Age. Multimodal is one of the keys and outcomes that bridged through the gaps in keeping up the fast and spontaneous flow of communication.
For students, most especially who have been born and exposed in the Digital Age, for them communication is not only represented with letters, words, and numbers but also a combination of images, audios, videos, live streams, social media platforms, apps, websites etc. which they get overflowing information. However, it’s not that easy for them to grasp everything by just reading and listening to them for few minutes. It depends on how information was created and presented which will be perceivable for the students’ cognitive level and proficiency level. It could also affect how much time their brain could process this overflowing information since most of the senses are actively working while reading all of those in different modes and forms at the same time. There could also be some distractors and interruptions during the process of comprehension. Unlike the traditional one, which I was exposed to, never had this variety of modes of communication. Though in my late teens, that was the first time I got in touch with computer and internet. It took me years before I was able to grasp its ways and operation but that was the start how we were asked to comply with the reports quickly. They thought that through technology and gadgets, it will lessen our time to spend on working with the projects and they could minimize the time for the deadline. Thinking how it will affect the communication globally, multimodal had expanded its range in exchanging information which had also contributed to the global economy.