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Investigating multiple literacies: WADESTOWN KINDERGARTEN COl Maggie Haggerty, Yvette Simonsen, Mandy Blake, and Linda Mitchell
Since 2002, the Centre of Innovation (Cal) research
programme, funded by the Ministry of Education,
has enabled teachers to work with researchers to document
and enhance their innovative approaches to learning and
teaching within their early childhood settings. Wadestown
Kindergarten became one of the six designated CO Is
in round three of the programme in 2006. This article
discusses the kindergarten's focus on multiple literacies
and its role in communicative competence and meaning
making. It draws on case study documentation from two
children, whose examples illustrate how literacies interact
and support each other, and the affordances offered by
different literacies or what different literacies enabled these
children to do. Kindergarten parents have been involved in
contributing to and interpreting pedagogical documentation
and as members of the cal research team. This article also
discusses how parent input has contributed to the analysis
and generated challenges for ongoing practice.
Wadestown Kindergarten is a two-teacher sessional
kindergarten with 30 four-year-olds attending in the
morning, five sessions a week, and 30 three-year-olds
attending in the afternoon, three sessions a week. The
kindergarten is nestled in the small community of
Wadestown, close to Wellington city. Kindergarten families
are predominantly from a high socioeconomic background.
The kindergarten's programme is regarded as special for
its exploration of multiple literacies within the use of
a project approach. Partnership with parents, whanau,
and community is another strong feature. Parents and
community are regularly involved in projects, assessment,
activities, special events, and daily sessions. There is a well
supported roster of parent helpers and family members who
regularly opt to stay at the kindergarten during sessions.
EARLYCH
Focus on multiple literacies Wadestown Kindergarten's focus on multiple literacies is on
literacies as ways of conceptualising and knowing as well as
on literacies as means of communicating. This focus links
with the communication strand of Te Whitriki (Ministry
of Education, 1996), which highlights domains beyond
the print-based or verbal-based literacies that have tended
to predominate in literacy discourse. Te Whitriki refers to
a number of possible modes of expression: "images, art,
dance, drama, mathematics, movement, rhythm and music"
(Ministry of Education, 1996, p. 72). We are investigating
how the different modalities children use in communicating
and meaning making interact and support each other. What is meant by literacy and what constitutes a literacy
is contested. Traditionally, the notion of literacy has
been language based and included reading, writing, and
verbal literacies. This has been so despite a long history
of music, dance, drama, and the visual arts as forms of
communication. Kress (2000) points out that a focus on
language alone" ... has meant a neglect, an overlooking, even
a suppression of the potentials of all the representational
and communicational modes ... and a neglect equally,
as a consequence, of the development of theoretical
understandings of such modes" (p. 157).
Now, the term "literacy" is being used to suggest
competence in a wider range of areas. Alongside those who
advocate retaining the focus on written and verbal language,
it is increasingly being argued that literacy should be seen
as plural in nature and as embodying a range of modalities
(Cope & Kalantzis, 2000). Technological developments
have stimulated an interest in technological literacy (New
London Group, 1996). The capacity to consttuct texts
which draw on a range of modalities, to integrate words
t FOLIO 1112007
with images, sound, music, and movement, has led to a resurgence
of interest in different representational and communicational modes,
in particular, in relation to digitally afforded multimodality (Hull &
Nelson, 2005). The field of literacy studies is also being challenged and
expanded to incorporate domains such as media literacy (Marsh, 2006),
emotional literacy (Zembylas & Vrasidas, 2005), and critical literacy
(Vasquez, 2003).
Within early childhood education in New Zealand, the work of
Roskill South Kindergarten as a COl (Lee, Hatherly, & Ramsey, 2002;
Ramsey, Breen, Sturm, & Lee, 2006) and exemplars in Kei Tua 0 te PaelAssessment for Learning (Minis tty of Education, 2005) have examined
ways in which children have extended their communicative competence
through developing expertise in use of information and communication
technology (lCT). The Arts have also been a focus of recent research in
early childhood education within another COl project (Wright, Ryder,
& Mayo, 2006). Our project contributes new dimensions to this growing
body of work.
In this article, we use the term "affordance" to refer to the particular
properties or capacities of a given literacy and the way these capacities
facilitate different kinds of communication and learning. We draw on
the work of a number of writers who use the notion of affordance as a
way of helping to describe the relationship between the learner and the
setting (Carr, 2000; Kress, 2000); a relationship Wertsch (1995, cited in
Carr, 2000) suggests involves social and discursive practices as well as the
materials and tools available. Much of the writing on affordance relates
to materials and tools. Norman (1988, cited in Carr, 2000), for example,
uses the term affordance to refer to the perceived and actual properties
of an object or artefact, in particular, those properties that determine
just how it could possibly be used. Carr (2000) focuses on the affordance
of everyday tools and materials-staplers, glue, scissors, tape, paint, and
card-in relation to children's learning in a New Zealand early childhood
setting. The trend in recent work has been to focus more specifically on the
affordances of digital technologies (Hull & Nelson, 2005; Marsh, 2006).
Carr (2000) emphasises that the focus in her study is not only the role the
technologies and tools play in the children's learning, but the role social
practices playas mediational means for learning (Wertsch, 1995, cited in
Carr, 2000). Like Carr, we are interested in the role social practices play.
Our particular interest is the role different literacies playas mediational
means for learning and communication. For us, the notion of affordance
is a useful one in helping to describe and conceptualise those properties of
a given literacy, which facilitate different possible ways of communicating
and knowing.
We have adopted an open attitude and exploratory approach in our
investigation using a range of methods of data collection, including
photographs, videotaped recordings, and field notes of samples of:
curriculum events where multiple literacies are evident; case studies
of six children over 18 months of age; interviews with participants
including parents, whanau, and children; and focus group discussions
with kindergarten parents. These provide a range of perspectives.
In this article, we explore the way two children, James and Miro,
lise and combine different literacies in the processes of communicating
and meaning making. We discuss insights offered by James' and Miro's
Elillilil'S and other kindergarten parents, and the implications of these
insigllls {ilr teacher practice.
James
James has a particular facility for using and combining different literacies
to communicate. In this section, we focus on an episode in which James
interweaves gesture, verbal explanation, and drawing. The following was
a key episode in drawing our attention to James' multimodal repertoire,
and how this repertoire furnishes him with avenues for exploring how
things work and for constructing meaning.
The episode began with James responding to a question-which Maggie
(relieving teacher) had asked him in passing-with the thumbs in gesture,
pictured in the photo below (see Figure 1). Intrigued, Maggie copied
the thumbs in gesture and asked: "What does this mean, James?" James
replied that it means: "I don't know."
FiGURE 1 JAMES: "I DON'T KNOW"
James proceeded to demonstrate a virtual vocabulary of gestures. The
thumbs down gesture in the next photo (Figure 2), James explained as:
"Not true ... You are not telling the truth."
FiGURE 2 JAMES: "NOT TRUE"
EARLl( CIIII .fUIOOIXF(}I 1.1: 2007
J ames then started to interweave drawing alongside gesture and
explanation. He portrayed, "This is scary", first as the static, mime-like
pose (Figure 3), then as the drawing: "Being scared" (Figure 4).
FIGURE 3 JAMES: "THIS IS SCARY"
FIGURE 4 JAMES' DRAWING: "BEING SCARED"
James produced two further drawings in quick succession: "Being shy"
(Figure 5), and "A lion being fierce" (Figure 6). He named both, without
prompting, as he drew.
FiGURE 5 JAMES'
DRAWING: "BEING SHY"
• F!GU!\E JAMES'DRAWING
"A LION BEING FIERCE"
17
With his next drawing: "Being brave" (Figure 7), James offered a fuller
verbal explanation of the detail it contains, to help to make sense of
what the picture involves: "This is being brave. There's a thing going
in there, but he's not crying. It's a pincher thing." Without this fuller
supplementary information, what is pictured would be difficult to
understand.
FIGURE 7 JAMES' DRAWiNG: "BEING BRAVE"
J ames then demonstrated "Being brave". He strikes a pose that looked to
us to be a re-enactment of a pincher thing going into his arm.
Mter a further drawing of "Crying ... bad crying ... 'cause that really
hurts", James' focus shifted from drawing such "states of being". Then
James drew "A shadow" (Figure 8).
Next, he drew a mirror: "This is looking in the mirror. There are two
people" (Figure 9).
FIGURE 8: JAMES'
DRAW!NG:"A SHADOW"
FIGURE 9 JAMES' DRAWING:
"lOOKING IN THE MiRROR"
The ease with which James was able to use drawing to portray the concepts
of shadow and mirror image intrigued us. We were particularly fascinated
by the role the medium of drawing itself was playing in facilitating James'
exploration of these phenomena. It seemed as though it was in and
through the visual medium that James was doing this. Drawing seemed
to operate as a vehicle or tool and to have particular features or properties
EARLY (:EI]LDHOOD FOUO 1 I: 2007
that served as enablers. In our later reading, we found a real connection
between the idea that drawing was offering James particular capacities,
which we recognised, but were struggling to explain, and the notion of
different media offering particular affordances (Carr, 2000; Kress, 2000),
some of which may have been very specific to James.
The mix of fascination and amazement, which we experienced through
witnessing James' fluency with different modalities, was later echoed in
comments made by two parents after they viewed his documentation at
the focus group meeting. We thought the level of interest these and other
parents showed in the documentation significant, and were fascinated by
some of the parallels between our discussion and that offered by parents.
For example, the way in which Parent A compared the complexity and
challenge of having to describe the phenomena of mirrors and reflection
verbally, "You just say it shows my reflection, but at the same time that's
not really describing it," with what was achieved in a drawing: "With a
few stick lines, in a few seconds." We see close parallels between these
comments and the ideas we had been exploring concerning the particular
affordances of a given literacy:
Parent A:
Parent B:
Parent A:
Parent B:
If someone did ask you to describe what a mirror was,
you would actually have to stop and think ...
Yeah you would.
You just say it shows my reflection, but at the same
time that's not really describing it. He was able to do
it with a few stick lines in a few seconds.
And also in drawing the expressions, he grasped the
concept and did a very similar thing.
We also find it significant that the documentation that engaged these
parents was not their own children's documentation. Their thoughtful
engagement runs contraty to the commonly held view that parents will
only ever be interested and ready to fully engage with documentation
that involves their own children.
Immediately after this focus group meeting, James and his family
moved to Vanuatu. In order to better understand James' use of different
literacies, this left us having to retrace the beginnings ofJames' gestural and
drawing literacies as fully as we could through pedagogical documentation
and teacher recollections. We thought it significant that many of Yvette
and Mandy's (Wadestown Kindergarten teachers) recollections were of
times James' mum, Justine, went to considerable lengths to affiliate with
James' chosen mode of expression. The following example, one of those
Mandy shared, also catches the sense of fun and enjoyment both teachers
frequently observed in James' and Justine's exchanges:
My most vivid memory is of James at mat time, greeting Justine
when she comes ro pick him up with this impossibly difficult body
contortion, saying: 'Bet you can't do this, Mum.' [Mandy offers a
rendition ofJames' 'impossibly difficult body contortion'.] And she
Uustine] put down her cell phone and her car keys. A twinkle in her
eye. And a smile. And she did it.
Parker-Rees (2007), studying verbal and gestural conversations between
adults and babies in the United Kingdom, notes "the pedagogical [italics
added] importance of adults' enjoyment of these conversations" (p. 4).
He goes on to observe that, "infants' choices about how fully they will
cngage in imitative exchanges seem to be influenced by their awareness
of the extcnt to which a communication partner is 'tuned in' to their
own movements, rhythms and vocalisations" (p. 7).
. Justine later briefly visited New Zealand and spoke to us about James'
use of gesture and drawing. Justine told us that her response to James'
use of gesture and dramatic play had been to "go with it ... like he might
decide that it's Number One's [a fictional character] birthday today, so
we'll bake a cake. And it's not, but we'll do it anyway." James' drawing
(see Figure 10), Justine explained, is something he has spent a lot of time
doing: "He will sit and just ... just be into drawing." A key factor in the
origins of James' drawing was the input of James' dad, Grant, and his
architectural drawings and models:
At home all we ever really did with the kids was draw and build.
Maybe because of what Grant does ... building and drawing at his
board ... He would be in the office downstairs ... but the boys would
go down all the time when they were little and he would explain what
he was doing.
The influence of Grant's architectural activities on James' drawing is clearly
apparent in the sketch in Figure 10, which Justine showed us. James drew
this recently, straight after watching his dad produce a concept design.
FIGURE 10 JAMES' HOUSE SKETCH
Miro Miro has a rich communication repertoire, which includes the drawing,
conversation, and questions, which feature in this discussion. This
episode centres around a drawing (see Figure 11), which Alex, Miro's
mum, showed us during a parent interview. The drawing is significant,
not only because of its communicative and conceptual complexity, but
because it was Miro's mum who brought the drawing to our attention.
And it is through Alex's explanations and insights that we learn of its
complexity. Alex first explained how the drawing came about and how
Miro responded when asked what her drawing was about:
Hi
Miro goes to gym on a Monday, and she's meant to hoist herself
up to the bar and then spin around, and she just couldn't do it. She
wouldn't do it, so she drew this yesterday. And 1 just said to her
today, 'What's this all about?', and she said, 'I don't know how to
swing over the bar at the gym.'
FARLY CHILDHOOD FOLIO I 11 2007
FIGURE 11 MIRO'S DRAWING OF HERSELF AT THE GYM
Yvette
(teacher):
Alex:
Alex:
Is that a thought bubble?
Yeah, that's a thought bubble. I showed her how
to do those. A few weeks ago, I showed her [what]
to do-we talked about a dog, because a dog was
walking down the middle of the road and she said,
'What's that dog doing, just walking down the
middle of the road?', and I said, 'What's that dog
doing?' And we had this conversation about 'Do
dogs think?' and 'What do dogs think?'
... and how people think, and how people speak, so
there's speech bubbles and thought bubbles. So she's
obviously used that, and I said, 'What's that?' and she
said, That's me thinking about falling off the bar' ...
You've got the grumpy face, because she's there at the
bar and she doesn't know what to do.
In going back over this interview transcript, we wondered what would
have happened if Yvette hadn't asked Alex the question about Miro's
use of the thought bubble. How important was Yvette's question in
helping to open up the dialogue? How significant was it that Yvette's
question was about the drawing? It is from Alex's response to Yvette's
question that we found out how Miro acquired her knowledge of the
graphic conventions of thought bubbles and speech bubbles, and that
Miro learnt this from Alex. Alex's response also offers rich insights of a
family culture of conversation and questions, for example, the way Alex
responded to Miro's question: "What's that dog doing, just walking
19
down the middle of the road?", with a question rather than an answer.
The conversation Alex and Miro then went on to have was also based
around a succession of questions.
Research in the field of family literacy has emphasised the importance
of congruence between the family or home literacies and those of the
educational service (McNaughton, 1995). The work on family literacy
we have accessed has been school based and primarily concerned with
print-based literacy Qayatilaka, 2001). However, we would suggest that
Yvette's questioning is an example of the congruence McNaughton
refers to, and that the significance of this congruence not only relates
to the family's culture of questioning, but to the family's connection
with drawing.
Later, in reflecting on Miro's drawing and the interview with Miro's
parents, Alex and lain, Yvette noted:
I was 'blown away' with this drawing. Here, Miro was thinking about
thinking and representing this through her artwork-a symbolic
representation of her metacognition! Miro's drawing was affording
her an opportunity to visualise herself mastering a situation. This
drawing was a catalyst for a shift in thinking for myself in terms of
how I saw Miro as a communicator and the role that drawing was
having for her as an active meaning maker.
This episode also highlighted for me the importance of having these
meaningful discussions with parents and whanau, and making time to
do this in order to gain insights into the child's world. When reflecting
on this, I was reminded of a passage I recently read from a book, Insights:
Behind Early Childhood Pedagogical Documentation, in which Fleet,
Patterson, and Robertson (2006) explained the importance of pedagogical
documentation in building relationships between educators and families.
They spoke primarily about the documentation provided by teachers for
families; but what I saw and recognised through this example was that
the parents were sharing samples of pedagogical documentation with
teachers about Miro's thinking and learning that lead to a greater "shared"
understanding about her literacy. The background information given to
us from Miro's parents about the picture added to its meaningfulness.
I was challenged to question how to do this for the wider community.
How do we have those meaningful discussions with families to gain
insights into children's learning? How do we build a culture of shared
understanding where families feel they can share examples of their
children's learning with teachers?
Conclusion A key insight from these case studies is that the literacies in which children
develop competence are not only worthwhile in themselves as a modes
of expression and communication, but serve as vehicles for children to
develop understandings, to think about their worlds, conceptualise and
imagine what might be, and explore emotions. Hence, for example:
James' use of drawing to explore sophisticated concepts of shadow and
mirror image and of emotional states; and Miro's use of drawing to
portray herself accomplishing difficult tasks. This insight ties in with the
notion that a given literacy offers affordance or a pathway that mediates
children's learning. One speculation that we intend to pursue through
further research is that the properties of a given literacy are associated
with particular types of learning.
Parents are positioned within our research as valued members of
the project, encouraged to contribute to the analysis and to offer
EARLY CHILDHOOD FOLIO 11: 2007
input from their perspectives. The insights parents provided about
their own children, and the discussion we had together, enabled us to
better understand and interpret the origin and meaning of children's
literacies, and how they are valued and encouraged within the home.
McNaughton (1995) suggests that it is through family activities that
children" develop ideas and values about literacy practices and activities
and their personal and social identity" (p. 17) . We found examples of
this in our case studies, where parents so clearly enjoyed, encouraged, and
responded to their children's literacy practices. These parents seemed to
go to some considerable lengths to affiliate with their children's chosen
mode of expression and, to a degree, shared an interest in or aptitude
for these literacies.
The richness of the pedagogical documentation acted as a catalyst for
discussion with parents. It opened avenues for talking, not only about
parents' own children, but about the literacies of other children attending
the kindergarten, and about ideas and values concerning different
literacies and their role in the broader kindergarten community.
These findings have implications for evetyday practice. They highlight
the importance of: building a culture with parents of shared learning;
having conversations with parents about the drawings, dances, and
technology; going beyond the superficial within these conversations to
gain insights about children's interests and capacities, and how parents
interpret them. Asking questions and being ready to learn from parents,
as well as teachers sharing their professional perspectives with parents, is
part of a culture that enables parental input in pedagogical discussion.
Acknowledgements Special thanks to Anne Meade and Margaret Carr for their useful advice
in the writing of this article.
We would like to thank the Ministty of Education for CO I funding
and support. Copyright for this article is held by the Crown. The views
expressed in this article are the views of the authors and do not represent
the views of the Crown.
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pedagogy in the first years oflife. Early Years, 27(1), 3-17.
Ramsey, K., Breen, J., Sturm, J., & Lee, W. (2006). Roskill South Kindergarten
Centre o.f'fnnovation 2003-2006. Hamilton: The University ofWaikato
School of Education, Wilf Malcolm Institute of Educational Research.
Vasquez, V. M. (2003). Negotiating criticalliteracies with young children.
Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Wright, J., Ryder, D., & Mayo, E. (2006). Putting identity into community:
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Mallhl Higgerty is a sAl:nkw lecturer at the of Education at of and is a research associate
Email: .... .It ............. . Unda Mltche:!!: !sa senior reMI\~n::her at the New Zealand Council
Researchand a rlls,ean::h lij.SSOCI,ax€
EmaU: Yvette S.:imons.en and Mandy Blak*, are teachers at Wadestown
::M EARLY CHILDHOOD FOUO 11: 2007
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