In “Multiliteracies, E-Literature and English Teaching,” Len Unsworth explains a framework that may assist teachers when using digital resources to increase literacy and learning. The three frameworks discussed are: organizational, interpretative, and pedagogic.
Organizational: is describing the articulation of convention and computer-based literary narratives for children and adolescents.
Interpretative: addressing the increasingly integrative role of language and images in the construction of literary meanings in electronic and book formats
Pedagogic: describing various types of online contexts for developing understanding about different dimensions of literary experience.
Unsworth also argues that teachers are not comfortable using digital multimedia in their classrooms and because of that, they may reject incorporating it into their curricular and pedagogic approaches. This is extremely important. Teachers must familiarize themselves with digital multimedia rather than rejecting it. The same argument, I believe, applies to graphic novels—oftentimes, teachers feel uncomfortable teaching graphic novels because they are very uneducated on the literature. Instead, teachers see graphic novels as engaging and fun texts that cannot be taught on its own but rather as a supplemental text.
Overall, I found Unsworth’s article too simplistic. Moreover, though he makes important claims on the positive effects of e-literature and online literary resources to literacy in English Language Arts classroom, a part of me cannot help but think that teachers are already doing these things in their classroom. Perhaps I think this way because this article is outdated. Also, in regards to e-literature, I do not see why teachers would oppose e-literature. The only reasons why I think they would reject it is because it’s not the same as holding a psychical print copy of a text. The smell of books that one is drawn to does not exist in e-literature. Besides, students spend most of their day in front of a computer screen anyway so wouldn’t it be better use of their time if they were reading an e-book?
Furthermore, I would like to draw your attention to the following questions and points I make:
-What are people’s thoughts on the Gutenberg Project (particularly on debates around intellectual property and ownership of literary texts)? For those that are unaware of the digital library, the Gutenberg Project offers over 45,000 free ebooks.
-I am also fascinated by Unsworth’s claim that video games are not a threat to the existence of books. I would like to hear more on Unsworth’s views on video games. Does Unsworth make this claim because he believes that video games do not contribute to literacy? I guess the discussion around video games and literacy fascinates me because the same arguments were (and continue to be) once made against graphic novels. Both graphic novels and video games contribute to literacy.
-I’m also wondering if e-literature and online literary resources will also have a positive effect on other subjects besides English? If so, which subjects and how will it benefit the class?
Unsworth, Len. “Multiliteracies, e-literature and English teaching.” Language and Education. 22.1 (2008): 62-75
1 response so far ↓
kaya // Jul 7th 2014 at 11:37 pm
You touched on some very interesting points concerning Unsworth’s article. I completely agree with you when you state, “Teachers must familiarize themselves with digital multimedia rather than rejecting it.” I think that we as teachers need to remind ourselves that our learning doesn’t just stop when we’ve successfully become teachers. We are learning just as much as students are learning on a daily basis. In order to become even better teachers, we need to be open to the idea that there is so much that we do not know and proudly show that we are interested to learn about new things. Isn’t that a message that we try to convey to our students – find inspiration to learn in order to open our minds even further? In my opinion, it’s completely fine for teachers to admit that they do not know something. After all, we are just as human as anyone else. I believe that this may play into your point about the importance of having teachers to familiarize themselves with areas that they are not experts in, such as digital multimedia and graphic novels. By doing so, teachers will not only become more educated in the content, but they will have more ideas and thoughts to offer to both their students and themselves.
Throughout your response, you later state, “Besides, students spend most of their day in front of a computer screen anyway so wouldn’t it be better use of their time if they were reading an eBook?” The first time I read this, my mind automatically changed some of the words making it read, “Besides, students spend most of their day in front of a computer screen anyways so wouldn’t it be better use of their time if they were reading [an actual novel]?” I approached this idea differently. In my opinion, I think that because students are surrounded by computers all day (at home, outside, in the mall, coffee shops etc.), I think that getting them to read from novels would give them a different learning experience compared to simply using their computers or some other form of technology. To me, reading from a computer is different in comparison to reading from a novel, something that you can hold, smell, see, etc. However, your view on the issue was also very interesting. If students are surrounded by all these amazing technological tools, why not just let them use them to help further their learning? Or better yet, why not show them other ways that they could use those tools?
Thank you for sharing your response! I very much enjoyed reading about your thoughts on the article!
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