Equity and Engagement Through Digital Storytelling and Game-Based Learning

This chapter is founded on the idea that literacy is the cornerstone of teaching and learning across disciplines and is the scaffold for quality communication across modes. Therefore, it contends that the ever-widening education and opportunity gaps seen throughout United States school systems have the potential to be bridged through engaging communicative literacy experiences. Information and resources provided are supported through a theoretical framework based on engagement theory, equitable access as a construct, and multiple literacies theory. As educational equity gaps continue to develop and widen for students based on race, income, language, and technology, it is imperative that innovative practices be researched, reviewed, and put into practice. By utilizing digital storytelling and game-based learning, this chapter attempts to provide the reader with a deeper understanding of issues related to classroom practice, educational equity, learning engagement, and literacy opportunities.

The Interpretation of “Local” Literacy Practices through Ethnography

Ethnography is a practice of inscribing local practice into texts, developed in the context of social anthropology. Local literacy practices often remain hidden, dependent on context and shaped by histories and cultures. Literacy is entwined with how lives are lived. Collaborative ethnography enables an approach that permits researchers to collaboratively develop research questions with participants and, rather than researching on people, researchers work with people as coresearchers. Local literacy practices are situated in homes and communities as well as within everyday contexts such as markets and mosques. Community literacy practices can be collaboratively understood and studied using this approach. Communities experience and practice diverse and multiple literacies, both locally and transnationally, and mapping this diversity is key to an understanding of the fluid and changing nature of literacies. Literacies can be understood as being multilingual, digital, transnational, and multimodal, thus expanding the concept of literacy as lived within communities. Threaded through this analysis is a discussion of power and whose literacy practices are seen as powerful within community contexts. Collaborative ethnography is a powerful methodology to excavate and co-analyze community literacy practices. Other methods that can explore local literacies include visual and sensory ethnography. Power sharing in terms of the design and architecture of the research is important for hearing voices and working equitably. There are many concepts introduced within, including the idea of literacy practices, the link between literacy and identity, the importance of an understanding of multilingualism, and the importance of situating literacy in communities.

Enabling School Librarians to Serve as Instructional Leaders of Multiple Literacies

Research has demonstrated that school leaders have little to no understanding of the instructional leadership role of the school librarian and have received little to no training in how to lead this population (Lewis, 2018; 2019). Though the standards of the school library field state that school librarians should be equipped and able to serve as instructional leaders of multiple literacies in K-12 education, barriers exist that inhibit this from becoming a reality in many schools. One of these barriers is a lack of administrative support in the form of a district library supervisor to develop a vision for and provide support to the district’s school library program and its personnel. Very little research has been conducted to examine the support needs of in-service school librarians (Weeks et al., 2017), and no research has been conducted to explore how to equip existing leadership to effectively lead its population of school librarians in a school district that lacks an official district library supervisor. The purpose of this study is to explore how school district leaders can foster the development of an effective school library in which school librarians serve as instructional leaders of multiple literacies.

Developing Multiple Literacies and Foundational Research Skills in Students through Audio Narratives on Global Warming Solutions

The introductory course at Penn State Brandywine--Earth in the Future: Predicting Climate Change and Its Impacts Over the Next Century--utilizes a scaffolded instructional approach and faculty from several campus units to develop multiple literacies (information, digital, science) and professional skills (writing and speaking) in students. The audio narrative assignment has provided additional outcomes beyond improved knowledge in climate science.

Literacy and Identity Development of Indigenous Rukai Children

This study examines the development of literacy and identity for young Indigenous Taiwanese children using ethnographic methods and the theories of multiple literacies, Indigenous knowledge, and identity construction, and it provides insights into the incorporation of Indigenous knowledge and literacies to create hybrid literacy spaces. Focused-upon participants included four 6-year-old Rukai-tribe children—two who lived in a city and two who lived in a village—and their families and teachers. We found that all children learned literacies in culturally meaningful contexts that involved stories and hybrid literacy practices, Indigenous foods, religious activities, traditional life skills, Indigenous language, and multiple forms of text. The two city children developed Rukai knowledge and literacies through performance-based contexts, whereas the village children learned through authentic contexts (e.g., observing farming and hunting). The literacy and identity of the two city children may be undermined due to limited access to Rukai resources, stemming from racism, classism, and linguicism.

Multiple Literacies Within Reformed First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Secondary Curriculum

This study illuminates reformed literacy expectations via close examination of the recently released 2019 Ontario (Canada), First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Secondary curricular document. A summative latent content analysis of the renewed provincial curriculum found overwhelming support for critical literacy development. The Ontario government uses the term literacy 84 times in the transformed curricula, prompting this study to ask: What are the literacies and how should these be attained in First Nations, Métis, and Inuit secondary level education? This study found required literacies expected in grades nine through 12, included English literacy and skills, media, financial, and critical literacies.

Literacy Events and Literacy Practices: A Critical Discourse Study of Intersection of Class, Gender and Literacy in Pakistan

This article attempts to examine some of the literacy practices in middle class youth of Pakistan over 18 years of age and determine the relationship between literacies, gender and particular middle class social practices. Young men and women of Pakistan acquire multiple literacies depending upon different social institutions they find themselves in and different discourses they are exposed to during course of their lives. These social institutions in turn shape their outlook and mould them into desired individuals. The literacies which have been identified in the current research include school literacies, home literacies, leisure time literacies, oral literacies, media literacies, religious literacies and communication channels related literacies. In order to achieve its ends, this research analyzes discourse samples of students of the Department of English, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan which were collected using qualitative methods of open-ended questionnaire and case studies. The questionnaire was conducted with 16 research participants (8 male and 8 female students). The findings have been discussed with case studies of two research participants (1 male and 1 female).

Traditional tales and contemporary art to promote multiple literacies

Storytelling-based arts projects offer a universal and inclusive pedagogy; challenging prejudices, celebrating diversity and promoting tolerance and resilience in participants. In addition they assist in the development of receptive and expressive language skills, provide a credible basis for understanding folklore, cultural traditions and social values, as well as offering a sound foundation for the pursuit of, and competency in, reading and writing. The contention that art and storytelling are global languages, lies at the heart of the storytelling based arts projects conducted by Australian storyteller, author and musician, Morgan Schatz Blackrose and Swiss Australian artist Roman W. Schatz.