Guy Merchant – författare

Undoing the Digital challenges common ways of understanding digital technology and its relationships to literacy and literacy education. The book explores how a sociomaterial perspective can provide an alternative analysis of literacy in the context of digital communication.

Introducing a series of conceptual tools and examples, the book examines digital communication as an emergent interweaving of social, material and semiotic resources. The perspective invites literacy research to focus more on the relations associated with the process of making meaning: the new collaborations, stories, conceptualisations, directions, and intentions that take shape in, and also help to shape, the contemporary mediascape.

Drawing on studies conducted in a variety of contexts, this book is key reading for all advanced students and researchers of literacy and digital media within Education, Applied Linguistics and Media/Communication Studies.

Undoing the Digital challenges common ways of understanding digital technology and its relationships to literacy and literacy education. The book explores how a sociomaterial perspective can provide an alternative analysis of literacy in the context of digital communication.

Introducing a series of conceptual tools and examples, the book examines digital communication as an emergent interweaving of social, material and semiotic resources. The perspective invites literacy research to focus more on the relations associated with the process of making meaning: the new collaborations, stories, conceptualisations, directions, and intentions that take shape in, and also help to shape, the contemporary mediascape.

Drawing on studies conducted in a variety of contexts, this book is key reading for all advanced students and researchers of literacy and digital media within Education, Applied Linguistics and Media/Communication Studies.

This book offers practical guidance for teachers using the National Literacy Strategy at Key Stages 1 and 2, based on the six categories of non-fiction outlined in the Strategy. It gives an accessible introduction to the features of each of these text types.Many teachers now feel confident in working with fiction and poetry, whereas the non-fiction objectives have been more challenging. The book includes new subject knowledge, such as understanding the linguistic features of different text types, and the need to find authentic reading material; practical classroom examples; high-quality photocopiable texts and activity sheets; and detailed guidance on how to work with the material at text, sentence and word level.Each chapter consists of a description of the genre, a text example, a photocopiable double-page spread giving an annotated version of the text, details of the classroom resources for developing the ideas and activity sheets for each text. The book will appeal to all teachers and student teachers working at Key Stages 1 and 2, English and Literacy advisers in LEAs, and providers of initial and in-service training.

This book offers practical guidance for teachers using the National Literacy Strategy at Key Stages 1 and 2, based on the six categories of non-fiction outlined in the Strategy. It gives an accessible introduction to the features of each of these text types.Many teachers now feel confident in working with fiction and poetry, whereas the non-fiction objectives have been more challenging. The book includes new subject knowledge, such as understanding the linguistic features of different text types, and the need to find authentic reading material; practical classroom examples; high-quality photocopiable texts and activity sheets; and detailed guidance on how to work with the material at text, sentence and word level.Each chapter consists of a description of the genre, a text example, a photocopiable double-page spread giving an annotated version of the text, details of the classroom resources for developing the ideas and activity sheets for each text. The book will appeal to all teachers and student teachers working at Key Stages 1 and 2, English and Literacy advisers in LEAs, and providers of initial and in-service training.

The growth of interest in virtual worlds and other online spaces for children and young people raises important issues for literacy educators and researchers. This book is a timely and much-needed collection of current research in the area. It provides a synthesis of knowledge and understanding and will be a key resource for scholars, students and teachers, particularly those interested in digital literacies. The work presents a coherent vision of current knowledge, and some of the most engaging, empirical research being undertaken on virtual worlds and online spaces in and beyond educational institutions. It contains international studies from the UK, North America and Australasia.

This is an important time for those researching virtual worlds, videogaming and Web 2.0 technologies, since there is growing professional interest in their significance in the education and development of children and young people. Whether these technologies are solely associated with informal learning or whether they should be incorporated into classroom contexts is hotly debated. This book provides a principled evaluation and appreciation of the learning, teaching and instruction that can occur in digital environments, showing children, young people and those who work with them as active agents with possibilities to navigate new paths.

The growth of interest in virtual worlds and other online spaces for children and young people raises important issues for literacy educators and researchers. This book is a timely and much-needed collection of current research in the area. It provides a synthesis of knowledge and understanding and will be a key resource for scholars, students and teachers, particularly those interested in digital literacies. The work presents a coherent vision of current knowledge, and some of the most engaging, empirical research being undertaken on virtual worlds and online spaces in and beyond educational institutions. It contains international studies from the UK, North America and Australasia.

This is an important time for those researching virtual worlds, videogaming and Web 2.0 technologies, since there is growing professional interest in their significance in the education and development of children and young people. Whether these technologies are solely associated with informal learning or whether they should be incorporated into classroom contexts is hotly debated. This book provides a principled evaluation and appreciation of the learning, teaching and instruction that can occur in digital environments, showing children, young people and those who work with them as active agents with possibilities to navigate new paths.

The increasing popularity of digitally-mediated communication is prompting us to radically rethink literacy and its role in education; at the same time, national policies have promulgated a view of literacy focused on the skills and classroom routines associated with print, bolstered by regimes of accountability and assessments. As a result, teachers are caught between two competing discourses: one upholding a traditional conception of literacy re-iterated by politicians and policy-makers, and the other encouraging a more radical take on 21st century literacies driven by leading edge thinkers and researchers. There is a pressing need for a book which engages researchers in international dialogue around new literacies, their implications for policy and practice, and how they might articulate across national boundaries.

Drawing on cutting edge research from the USA, Canada, UK, Australia and South Africa, this book is a pedagogical and policy-driven call for change. It explores studies of literacy practices in varied contexts through a refreshingly dialogic style, interspersed with commentaries which comment on the significance of the work described for education. The book concludes on the ‘conversation’ developed to identify key recommendations for policy-makers through a Charter for Literacy Education.

.

The increasing popularity of digitally-mediated communication is prompting us to radically rethink literacy and its role in education; at the same time, national policies have promulgated a view of literacy focused on the skills and classroom routines associated with print, bolstered by regimes of accountability and assessments. As a result, teachers are caught between two competing discourses: one upholding a traditional conception of literacy re-iterated by politicians and policy-makers, and the other encouraging a more radical take on 21st century literacies driven by leading edge thinkers and researchers. There is a pressing need for a book which engages researchers in international dialogue around new literacies, their implications for policy and practice, and how they might articulate across national boundaries.

Drawing on cutting edge research from the USA, Canada, UK, Australia and South Africa, this book is a pedagogical and policy-driven call for change. It explores studies of literacy practices in varied contexts through a refreshingly dialogic style, interspersed with commentaries which comment on the significance of the work described for education. The book concludes on the ‘conversation’ developed to identify key recommendations for policy-makers through a Charter for Literacy Education.

.

‘This an exciting publication that offers authentic approaches for educators to meet challenges of the literacy that students need in our evolving digital landscape.’

Maureen Walsh, Adjunct Professor, Australian Catholic University and Honorary Professor, The University of Sydney

‘In this significant new text, Cathy Burnett and Guy Merchant foreground the affective, embodied and emergent nature of making meaning with new media.’ 

Teresa Cremin, The Open University

The rise of new media technologies has changed the ways in which children engage with texts and this has implications for literacy provision in schools. Drawing on research exploring new media practices within and outside school, this book explains and encourages classroom activity that makes purposeful and appropriate use of these literacies and is underpinned by a set of guiding principles for teaching literacy in contemporary times. Key topics include:

This is essential reading for primary English or elementary language arts modules on initial teacher education courses including university-based and schools-based routes into teaching and also for current teachers wishing to enhance their own literacy teaching.

Cathy Burnett is Professor of Literacy and Education at Sheffield Hallam University. Guy Merchant is Professor of Literacy in Education at Sheffield Hallam University.