Children’s digital multimodal composing: implications for learning and teaching

ABSTRACT

This paper explores the implications of children’s out-of-school digital multimodal composing practices on learning and teaching in the formal educational context. It adopts a case study approach where publicly accessible YouTube video productions of three children around the world are examined. Applying a multimodal discourse analysis approach, we analyse the children’s videos and discuss what they suggest about the children’s literacies and skills. We argue that children’s digital multimodal composing practices demonstrate their creativity, critical thinking, and a semiotic awareness. Following the case studies, we discuss how the educators can respond to students’ out-of-school literacy activities by creating the ‘third space’ for learning in schools.

KEYWORDS:

• digital learning
• multimodal authoring
• multimodal compositions
• multiliteracies
• remix culture

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors

Fei Victor Lim is Assistant Professor at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He has published widely on multiliteracies, multimodal discourse analyses, and digital learning. He is interested in how and what we should teach learners in today’s digital and multimodal age. He is author of the book “Designing Learning with Embodied Teaching: Perspectives from Multimodality” published in the Routledge Studies in Multimodality.

Weimin Toh is Research Associate at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His main research areas are social semiotics, multimodal discourse analysis, game studies, narratology, and game based learning.

Notes

1 https://tinyurl.com/dmauthor1

2 https://tinyurl.com/dmauthor2

3 https://tinyurl.com/dmauthor2a

4 https://tinyurl.com/dmauthor3

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Start Up Grant for New Assistant Professors: [grant number SUG-NAP 4/18 VLF].