Exploring Learning Through Visual, Actional and Linguistic Communication: The multimodal environment of a science classroom

Abstract

This paper draws on ideas and data from the ESRC funded research 'Rhetorics of the science classroom: a multimodal approach'. It suggests that learning is realised through the interaction between visual, actional and linguistic communication (i.e. learning is multimodal) and involves the transformation of information across different communicative systems ('modes'), e.g. from speech to image. It demonstrates that learning is a process of selection, adaptation and transformation motivated by the interests of pupils and the context of learning. Specifically, it analyses the different ways four Year 7 science pupils transformed their teacher's descriptions of cells in their production of texts on onion cells (and the choices they engaged with in producing them), focusing in particular on their use of analogy.