Week 7 - Assignment 1

Theories and Practices of Multimodal Education: The Instructional Dynamics of Picture Books and Primary Classrooms

By Dawnene D. Hassett and Jen Scott Curwood

This article discussed the idea of multimodal literacy instruction. This concept was something that I had never heard about or even thought of really. The books and stories discussed, incorporated various textual elements with other modes of communication. There are different ways to draw meaning from books. I am used to reading a book and deciphering meaning from the words that are written. In these books, and the examples from the classrooms, meaning comes from different areas. The font, color, size, and shape of symbols on the page all have meaning to them. Each student can have a different perspective of what information is presented on the page. One interesting thing I took from this article was that this form of instruction generated student involvement. The students from the examples were engaged and able to express their ideas freely. This helps to encourage their creativity in their writing. The article also discusses roles that teachers should adopt to help student learning. They were teacher as resource manager, teacher as co-constructor, and teacher as design consultant. By doing these, teachers will help their students to better express themselves through their writing. I think that using multimodal literacy instruction in the classroom is a great idea. All students express themselves differently and this is a way for students to do that. Reading these types of books and creating their own works will allow students to think more critically about their writing.

Using the ADDIE Model to Design Second Life Activities for Online Learners

By Shiang-Kwei Wang and Hui-Yin Hsu

First off, this was a well written article and very informative. Great job by the authors J. I am what you might call a “newbie” to Second Life. The article explained all of the benefits of using Second Life in the classroom. Instructors can organize class field trips to different places of interest. I was unaware of all of the instructional information that is available on SL. Students can explore related websites, videos, or pictures of the desired content. I think that SL would be a great way to encourage interaction between classmates. I have no problem with how our class is set up, however there really isn’t much interaction between us. We do respond to each other’s blogs, but you do not get a true understanding of each other by doing this. I currently know very little about my fellow classmates. I think that the social interaction is the best part of SL and would be great for online classes. As far as using this in a classroom that meets face to face, many of the challenges mentioned in the article would make it difficult.