Supporting Literacy and Positive Identity Negotiations with Multimodal Comic Composing

Abstract

This study explores how an alternative writing unit with a focus on comics, choice, and publishing supported positive identity development in a fourth-grade classroom. Many traditional literacy practices with an emphasis on skills marginalize students from under-represented populations. This study reports literacy practices that countered the production of previously established unequal relationships and instead supported bilingual students’ negotiation of positive identities. We conducted an analysis of two bilingual case studies to examine the ways in which the shift from traditional literacy skills/practices to multimodal formats provided opportunities for students who were traditionally marginalized to renegotiate identities as experts and authors.

“Staring Down a Charging Bull”: Reconceptualizing Content and Disciplinary Literacy through Transmediation

“…It is even more critical for teacher candidates to be exposed to, work with, critically evaluate, and create multimodal texts such as visual journals. They will be expected to comprehend an ever-evolving understanding of literacy alongside with meaningful pedagogy that involves both online and offline practices (Laidlaw et al, 2021;Moses & Reid, 2021;Nagy, 2020;Yoon, 2020). This literacy, according to the Ontario Ministry of Education ( 2013) is "multimodal" (p. 2), builds on "prior knowledge and culture" (p. 3), is "rich and varied" (p. 3), and utilizes all six dimensions of language (reading, writing, listening, speaking, viewing, and representing).…”

“…Pedagogical opportunities at the heart of this framework are ripe for new lenses as we consider how modes and media continue to change in response to global and local needs. Multimodal meaning making opportunities are meant to scaffold, reinvent, and transform knowledge as well as individuals (Loerts & Heydon, 2016;Moses & Reid, 2021;Walsh, 2007). While the term, visual journals, is used in this research, the range of modalities including visual modalities were used to give the participants choice in what was most apt for their multimodal ensembles.…”

One Fourth-Grader’s Orchestration of Modes Through Comic Composition

“…Honoring multiple modes and different kinds of representational work may also help teachers reconceptualize what counts as reading and writing in schools. For example, researchers have documented ways in which multimodal curriculum units provided opportunities for emergent bilinguals and students with disabilities to renegotiate their identities and positioning in the classroom (Moses & Reid, 2021; Reid & Moses, 2021). Vasudevan et al (2010) showed how multimodal composing opportunities made it possible for fifth-graders to author new literate identities or authorial stances.…”

“…They then demonstrated their knowledge of how images and words might work together in print narratives through multimodal composition. The broader study documented the instructional practices and students’ use of a wide range of semiotic resources (Moses & Reid, 2021; Reid & Moses, 2020). However, those findings provide a generalized overview of all students but lack the in-depth analysis of a single comic.…”

Teaching with Comics for the First Time

“…Collectively, we have examined how graphic novel adaptations of young adult novels represent the narratives and position readers differently (Kachorsky & Reid, 2020). Stephanie has focused on reading and composing comics in elementary grades and has explored how some students were able to position themselves differently when representing and communicating narrative through the comics medium (Moses & Reid, 2021;Reid & Moses, 2020).…”