Reservoir hill and audiences for online interactive drama

This paper analyses the interactive experiences constructed for users of the New Zealand online interactive drama Reservoir Hill (2009, 2010), focusing both on the nature and levels of engagement which the series provided to users and the difficulties of audience research into this kind of media content. The series itself provided tightly prescribed forms of interactivity across multiple platforms, allowing forms of engagement that were greatly appreciated by its audience overall but actively explored only by a small proportion of users. The responses from members of the Reservoir Hill audience suggests that online users themselves are still learning the nature of, and constraints on, their engagements with various forms of online interactive media. This paper also engages with issue of how interactivity itself is defined, the difficulties of both connecting with audience members and securing timely access to online data, and the challenges of undertaking collaborative research with media producers in order to gain access to user data

Avaliação dos sites de aprendizagem de línguas. Discursos sobre língua, aprendizagem e aprendizes

Language learning websites (llw) became a potential source of language learning since the emergence of the World Wide Web. Just as any instructional material, llws enact views of language, learning, and learners through their semiotic designs (content and structural design). The study is an attempt to explore these three dimensions by examining the structure and contents of Pumarosa, a llw, and by focusing on the meaning-making process of one female user of this virtual environment. This case study draws on elements of multimodal semiotics and other qualitative techniques of data collection such as interviews, screen recording of actions on the virtual environment, and stimulated recall. Results indicate that the views of language, learning, and the way users are positioned on the llw exert significant influence on the meanings that the participant makes of these concepts   Las páginas web de aprendizaje de idiomas se han convertido en una fuente potencial de aprendizaje de idiomas desde la aparición de la World Wide Web. Al igual que cualquier material pedagógico, estas páginas web promulgan visiones sobre la lengua, el aprendizaje y los estudiantes a través de sus diseños semióticos (contenido y diseño estructural). Este estudio es un intento por explorar estas tres dimensiones mediante el examen de la estructura y los contenidos de Pumarosa, una página web de aprendizaje de inglés, y se centra en los usos de una estudiante-usuaria de este entorno virtual. Este estudio de caso se fundamenta en los elementos de la semiótica multimodal y otras estrategias cualitativas de recolección de datos, tales como entrevistas, grabación de la pantalla de acciones en el entorno virtual, y recuerdo estimulado. Los resultados indican que las visiones sobre la lengua, el aprendizaje y la forma en que los usuarios son posicionados en la página web ejercen una gran influencia sobre los significados que la estudiante-usuaria construye alrededor de esos conceptos Os sites de aprendizagem de línguas são uma fonte potencial de aprendizagem de línguas desde os inicios da World Wide Web. Como todo material pedagógico, esses sites divulgam visões sobre a língua, a aprendizagem e os estudantes através de suas concepções semióticas (conteúdo e concepção estrutural). Esse estudo visa explorar essas três dimensões avaliando a estrutura e conteúdos de Pumarosa, um site de aprendizagem de inglês, e concentra-se na experiência de uma estudante-usuária nesse entorno virtual. Esse estudo de caso baseia-se nos elementos da semiótica multimodal e outras estratégias qualitativas de coleta de dados, como entrevistas, gravação da tela de ações do entorno virtual e evocação estimulada. Os resultados indicam que as visões sobre a língua, a aprendizagem e a maneira na que os usuários são posicionados no site influenciam os significados que a estudante-usuária constrói desses conceitos.

Identity and Language Socialization of Asian Transnational Adolescents across Communities of Practice: A Critical Narrative Study

A large percentage of the international secondary students in the United States come from Asian countries. Their enrollments are closely connected to the cultural, curricular, and extracurricular diversity of their American schools. Despite their contribution, stereotypical depictions of these students and deficit-informed research still abound in educational settings, leaving serious consequences for the social and academic well-being of the students. These problematic educational framings about Asian international students and the majoritarian narratives about them are mutually informative. Therefore, to counter the dominant discourses, this multimodal critical narrative study set out to recruit stories from a group of Asian transnational adolescent students to illustrate an alternative reality. Specifically, five transnational youths attending high schools in Maine shared their perspectives and experiences of identity construction and transformation as well as language learning and use in the context of navigating across their communities of practice (CoPs), i.e., the social, academic, and extracurricular communities they belonged to. With narrative inquiry guided by methodological pluralism, I collected a series of found and produced narrative artifacts as data from the five core informants and analyzed the data set through the following approaches: narrative positioning analysis, Labovian analysis, visual/multimodal analysis, portrait analysis, and thematic analysis. The outcome of these analyses are findings presented as a series of positioning profiles and thematic connections. Overall, the findings indicate a connection between these adolescent students’ social networks, CoP participation, and personal transformations. They position themselves as multifaceted, dynamic, dilemmatic, and oftentimes, in relation to the other members in their CoPs. In terms of language socialization, there is a shared understanding of communicative competence as multimodal and situated, and of CoP participation as conducive to the acquisition of the symbolic capital of English. When examined in context, these findings, though not meant to be one-size-fits-all, yield significant implications for educational research and practice targeted at this student population. Specifically, educators need to acknowledge the unequal access to participation and learning among students with different identity configurations. They will also benefit from tapping into the students’ CoP practice as well as transnational funds of knowledge as symbolic resources. This will allow them to develop a more diverse conception of competence, which in turn helps them provide affirming educational experiences to the transnational adolescents. Despite some limitations and barriers resulting from COVID-related circumstances during the data collection phase, this study is significant because the processes of the adolescent students’ storytelling in different modalities added complexity to the stories told by them and ended up being as important as the stories themselves when it came to illustrating an alternative reality of Asian transnational adolescent students’ identities and language socialization

Contemporary Cypriot video art: an investigation of artistic practice and its educational implications for the visual arts curriculum

This qualitative project concentrates on the creative research processes of contemporary Cypriot video artists and on their interrelation with the field of visual arts education, examined through the triple role of artist/researcher/teacher. The project contains evidence of the achievement of a tangible research product in the form of an Educational Guide, accompanied by a DVD collection as a creative outcome that presents, in 10 DVDs, the video profiles of 10 local artists with a selection of their video artwork. The project adopts a pluralistic research methodology, and identifies and presents multiple results that are extracted from the artists’ case studies, together with a self-study concerning artistic research approaches to video art-making. The results are transformed through a hermeneutical and semiotic approach into educational suggestions for the employment of video art as an art form, and video as a medium into the visual arts educational context. The body of knowledge presented contributes to three major areas: the documentation and accessibility of the artistic practices of contemporary living Cypriot artists, the understanding of their artistic research processes, and the attribution of pedagogical value to video art’s content and context through the creation of educational materials that consider the availability of the artists’ video works. The outcome of the project is intended for general and visual arts educators, artists, art historians and gallery and museum professionals who wish to study the insights of video art in Cyprus through an audio-visual presentation. The overall contribution of the project to professional practice is summarised in the bridging of the gap between the sister fields of visual arts and contemporary visual arts education, by transforming everyday artistic practice in appropriate material for pedagogical contexts

The Writing Experiences of Urban Adolescents: A Multicase Study

In the field of adolescent literacy studies, writing has been neglected in both research and instruction (Juzwik, Curcic, Wolbers, Moxley, Dimling, & Shankland, 2005; Graham & Perin, 2007; Scherff & Piazza, 2005; Troia, 2007), especially in urban settings. Given the importance of writing instruction in secondary education, this qualitative case study investigates the writing experiences of five urban adolescent writers in a high school in a major city in the Southeastern U.S. Research questions included: (1) What are the writing experiences of urban adolescents in and out of school? and (2) In what ways do urban adolescents make use of multiliteracies in their writing experiences? This multicase study (Merriam, 1998; Stake, 1995) includes data collected from interviews, observations, field notes, samples of student work, and electronic messages. For a period of six months, five key participants acted as co-researchers by providing feedback and collaborating on inductive analysis of the data. Findings revealed that students employed multiple modes and genres of writing, and that they viewed social and technological contexts as important factors in their composing experiences. Despite these findings, the students did not have many opportunities to take advantage of recent advancements in 21st century writing approaches. The new ―Age of Composition‖ (Yancey, 2009) has not arrived in urban environments where concerns of power and access remain. This study contributes to the field of literacy studies by illuminating the experiences of the participants and providing recommendations for educators in urban contexts. As Yancey recommends, educators need to design a new model for 21st century composition instruction. The findings of this study suggest the following instructional implications for secondary classrooms: 1. 21st century composition instruction should include multimodal compositions and multimedia projects. 2. 21st century composition instruction should give a central role to the use of technology. 3. Students should have opportunities for personal expression and identity exploration. 4. Teachers should create composition lessons that engage and empower students. 5. 21st century composition instruction should be transformative

Assessing creativity in TV studio production

This paper will seek to gauge how media production can be taught within Higher Educational Institutions to inspire the next generation of programme makers to create original student led productions, rather than replicating content. Brown and Duthie ask how media educators and teachers of film and television production courses assess creativity and discuss innovative approaches to learning, teaching and assessment in the academy and ask how we can encourage risk taking in a risk averse environment. This paper considers whether contemporary global TV formats can be the catalyst for new ideas and content and how to encourage students to be film and TV making pioneers

Olfaction-enhanced multimedia: Perspectives and challenges

This is the post-print version of the Article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2011 Springer VerlagOlfaction—or smell—is one of the last challenges which multimedia and multimodal applications have to conquer. Enhancing such applications with olfactory stimuli has the potential to create a more complex—and richer—user multimedia experience, by heightening the sense of reality and diversifying user interaction modalities. Nonetheless, olfaction-enhanced multimedia still remains a challenging research area. More recently, however, there have been initial signs of olfactory-enhanced applications in multimedia, with olfaction being used towards a variety of goals, including notification alerts, enhancing the sense of reality in immersive applications, and branding, to name but a few. However, as the goal of a multimedia application is to inform and/or entertain users, achieving quality olfaction-enhanced multimedia applications from the users’ perspective is vital to the success and continuity of these applications. Accordingly, in this paper we have focused on investigating the user perceived experience of olfaction-enhanced multimedia applications, with the aim of discovering the quality evaluation factors that are important from a user’s perspective of these applications, and consequently ensure the continued advancement and success of olfaction-enhanced multimedia applications

The Influence of Watching English Cartoons on English Language Acquisition: A Case of Selected Filipino Preschoolers

In this 21st century era, young children have become keen users of multimedia technologies, more so than in the past generations when children could access various English cartoons. Due to exposure to English cartoons, preschoolers proficient in English tend to have difficulties acquiring the first language used in the speech community. Therefore, the study investigated the influences of English cartoons on preschoolers’ English language acquisition. It is anchored on Skinner’s Behaviorism, Krashen-Terrell’s Input Hypothesis, Kress and Van Leeuwen’s Multimodal Discourse, and Critical Age Period Theory. It adheres to Yin’s single holistic case study research design, where two (2) preschoolers were selected through a purposive sampling technique. The data were gathered during the four-week series of home observations and semi-structured in-depth interviews within the seven-month study duration. Furthermore, data were analyzed following the thematic analysis method. Results revealed that preschoolers’ English language acquisition is affected by certain factors, i.e., exposure to multimedia technologies, social relationship/linguistic environment, motivation, attitudes, and interests of the child. Regarding phonological influence, preschoolers articulate terms based on the pronunciation heard from cartoon shows. F/P1 acquires a British accent, and both participants can utter all vowel/consonant sounds except ‘r.’ They can use words even without understanding their context. Concerning semantic influence, active exposure to cartoons and engagement in an immediate environment led to meaning-making processes strengthening critical and creative thinking skills. Regarding syntax, participants’ multi-word utterances are drawn from longer potential sentences that express a complete thought. Although the words produced are ungrammatical by adults’ standards, they still adhere to grammatical rules. Keywords: English Language Acquisition; English Cartoons; Preschoolers; Factors; and Influence

Digital Literacies And “glee”: The Role Of Fan Fiction Virtual Writing And Social Commentary In Response To Bullying Themes With Adolescent Writers

ABSTRACT DIGITAL LITERACIES AND “GLEE”: THE ROLE OF FAN FICTION VIRTUAL WRITING AND SOCIAL COMMENTARY IN RESPONSE TO BULLYING THEMES WITH ADOLESCENT WRITERS by MANDY STEWART May 2017 Advisor: Dr. Gina DeBlase Major: Curriculum and Instruction Degree: Doctor of Philosophy As the education system turns its attention to climate, bullying, and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) issues in the classroom, there is a focus on developing our student population abilities to be more accepting and tolerant of diversity. This study explored how ten students, aged 16-17, interacted with virtual literacy events on www.fanfiction.net, and how that contributed to their refinements in understandings, perspectives, actions and tolerance of diversity, particularly as it related to LGBT teens and bullying, as demonstrated in original writing as well as in commentaries and responses to other writers. As these teenagers wrote about LGBT topics in their published writing, interacted with other participants through their reviews/online messaging, and read other fan fiction stories focused on LGBT bullying storylines, it allowed participants’ to have ongoing and emerging understandings of LGBT issues in an anonymous, virtual space. This study explored how the participants navigated the www.fanfiction.net site, within a virtual fan fiction community devoted to the television program Glee, which features LGBT bullying plots. The study participants wrote original stories and published them on the site, followed other fan fiction authors, and actively read/reviewed stories on these topics. The norms of this virtual community discourages negative commentary, while favoring interactions that encourage writers, creating an affinity space that participants described as welcoming and supportive as they explored LGBT topics that might be perceived as offensive in the real world. With case studies on the three most prolific writers, this research demonstrates the diverse backgrounds, interests, and writing styles of fan fiction participants, even with writing focused on the same television show, and allows the reader to delve into what the experience of interacting on the site is like from the writer’s perspective. In analyzing all participant data, I found that literacy transactions on the fan fiction website allowed for participants’ ongoing and emerging understandings of LGBT issues, the anonymity of the website created a safe space which allowed for exploration of LGBT topics, and the positive acceptance of LGBT storylines during interactions on www.fanfiction.net gave opportunities to further explore LGBT issues/themes

Encounters with texts outside of school in English in 8th-10th grade: Influences and potential for working with texts in ELT.

Master i grunnskolelærerutdanning 5-10, Engelsk. Nord universitet 202