Thoughts on multimodal design and education
Kress’s article highlights the need for design theory to fit the multimodal environment that represents and depicts present-day knowledge. He asserts that “[i]nstead of competence in relation to stable social frames and stable resources for representation, we need the notion of design, which says: In this social and cultural environment, with these demands for communication of these materials, for that audience, with these resources, and given these interests of mine, what is the design that best meets these requirements? (2005, p.20) This design is not one that is stagnant or labelled as a ‘one size fits all’, but it is transformative in nature with the ability to change as needs request and flexible enough to move beyond what has been and what is present. Ideally, this design would encounter the audience individually and adapt as the encounter progressed.
Upon reading Kress’s words on design of a multimodal environment, I recalled the caution of Josh Skuse regarding the transferring of picture books from print to ebook format. He states that “[w]hat many publishers are doing wrong at the moment is just copying printed picture books on to this format, which does both media a disservice. It’s just like looking at a PDF. Children will simply flick through.” (Popova, 2012) In describing the transferring of picture books into a digital experience, the need to consider design is blatant, just as it is when transferring traditional education to an online elearning environment. In my own research on authentic learning in an elearning classroom, I was introduced to nine key aspects of an effective elearning environment that stretch the online educator to design learning environments beyond that of a digital textbook. The key aspects of authentic elearning include such learning goals of real-life knowledge and activities, collaboration, modelling and articulation. (Herrington, J., Reeves, T.C. & Oliver, R. 2010). Moving writing to an effective and engaging visual format requires more than a copy and paste function.
In considering a design theory for online learning, taking into account Kress’s questions as mentioned above is valuable. Design theory for online learning cannot be conventional, even though the ease of a linear approach to learning seems tempting and easy to implement. Instead, educators need to take into account what an online learning environment can, and should be – an area with many entry points and pathways as described by Bolter “that weave their way through a textual space” (17%) allowing the opportunity for the student to access more ownership of his learning and to be engaged in constructivist learning activities. Balancing, through complementing, the text with the visual, the educator is afforded the opportunity to design a learning environment with an increasingly interactive and meaningful context. With the addition of the audio and video components as well as collaborative features, the educator can individualize learning for the student to an even more defined extent.
Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of
print [2nd edition]. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Herrington, J., Reeves, T.C. & Oliver, R. (2010) – A guide to authentic e-learning. Retrieved
from http://researchrepository.murdoch.edu.au/1903/
Kress, G. (2005). Gains and losses: New forms of text, knowledge and learning. Computers and
Composition, 22, 5-22. doi:10.1016/j.compcom.2004.12.004
Popova, M. (2012). A brief history of children’s picture books and the art of visual storytelling.
Retrieved from: https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/02/24/childrens-picturebooks/