For my redesign of the “What’s in My Bag?” task, I created a digital textile collage in Genially that represents the textures of the items I carry. Instead of using photos, I layered digital fabrics, patterns, and colours to evoke touch and mood. Canvas for my tote bag, green leather for my wallet, and pink metallic plastic for the Nerds candy, yellow and black crochet for my keychain, bronze metal for my key and black matte plastic for my headphones.
Designing this piece helped me think differently about how materials communicate meaning. Translating texture into digital form was challenging since touch can only be suggested, not experienced, but this limitation revealed how digital media can both mimic and reshape sensory experiences. The process helped me see design as more than visual, but can also be tactile. My final piece became less about “what I carry” and more about “how it feels to carry it,” turning everyday objects into a digital expression of identity.
This redesign connects directly to the Pedagogy of Multiliteracies (The New London Group, 1996) and Cope and Kalantzis’s (2009) theory that literacy extends beyond words to include visual, tactile, spatial, and digital forms of meaning. By transforming tactile experience into a digital collage, I explored what Cope and Kalantzis (2009) describe as “meaning as design” the active process of reshaping ideas across modes. The project also aligns with the four components of multiliteracies pedagogy:
- Situated practice: I began with personal, familiar items.
- Overt instruction: I learned new digital layering and texture techniques.
- Critical framing: I reflected on how texture and touch change in digital form.
- Transformed practice: I created a multimodal artifact that uses digital texture to express identity.
In the end, my “digital textile” reimagines a simple inventory into a multimodal self-portrait. It demonstrates how meaning can be redesigned through texture, technology, and imagination.
References
Cope, B., & Kalantzis, M. (2009). “Multiliteracies”: New literacies, new learning. Pedagogies: An International Journal, 4(3), 164–195. https://doi.org/10.1080/15544800903076044
The New London Group. (1996). A pedagogy of multiliteracies: Designing social futures. Harvard Educational Review, 66(1), 60–92.
Be First to Comment