Week 7 assignment 1 Article reflection

1. Theories and Practices of Multimodal Education:

In today’s teaching in the classroom, teacher needs to use multimodal ways to inform students about learning theories and practice. The multimodal theories include Picture books, interaction with peers, gesture, drama, drawing, and ways of incorporating, integrating and extending linguistic signs. The digital media also can be a way to help students in literacy learning. Students can decode and comprehend alphabetic print in conjunction with other socially and culturally shaped forms of representation. As a teacher when we design the class, we are no longer in the path of what we respect students to learn. We are making a lesson plan to reach the teaching goal by understanding students’ background, culture, and needs.  Use multimodal theories in teaching inspires student’s literacy practicing on writing and bring the interest of student’s literacy learning. For example, teacher use read-aloud to encourage students to think “multidimensionally” (Bearne,  2005,  p.  22), that is, to represent their own meanings in multiple ways.

The social activities become a core of new literacy, in the multimodal class design teaching can drive (1) images/drawings, (2) writing, (3)  font  design  and  placement,  (4)familial  and  cultural  connections  to  students’  lives,  (5)  relative  size  of  images/writing,  and  (6)  use  of  color  to  express  meaning.  In other words, each student’s page was “multimodal,” demonstrating more ways of representing thought than their planning sheets or traditional linear writing could allow. Bezemer and Kress  (2008)

The multimodal theories teaching make the teacher and students more flexible on the teaching and learning and creates a theory that students learn by their needs and hands-on what they learn.

2.Online game activities for student’s literacy learning.

“Second Life” is a 3 D multi-user virtual environment massively multiplayer online role-playing game. Many universities adopt using second life game as a part of the new literacy lesson. Students learn literacy when they play the game, the game creates a communicate environment, students can interact in the game, it practices on students’ writing reading and communication skills. The game enriches students learning experience, it provides a near-real-life and gives player opportunities to explore and examine on what they learned on the game world. Educator also can use the game as a tool to design their class and provide a fun learning journey to let students explore and experience phenomena of interest. Technology integrate students learning helps learners and educators develop their learning skills in multimodal ways. It makes students learning more vivid and efficient.

Meanwhile, there are challenges as an educator we need to consider. Because it is not a face-to-face class through the course-management system, the instructor does have authority to lock the online learning campus. The instruction may face a problem of giving each individual attention on online learning. The educator needs to limit the amount of class capacity and ensure the quality of learning and teaching.