MOVING TOWARDS THE DIGITAL CLASSROOM

Margaret Anne Clarke

University of Portsmouth

Keywords: CMC, multimedia, institutions, adaptation, pedagogical

strategies

This presentation will focus on the modes of adaptation that institutions, teachers and
learners necessarily have to make in their pedagogical and learning processes to
newly installed computer-mediated and multimedia learning environments.
Although much work has been done on the potential of multimedia and digital
classroom applications, there is still little substantive work on the use of these
applications within a specific higher education framework, and above all the
institutional factors which may block or facilitate the successful adaptation of the
multimedia application to its immediate context, which in general has been under-
researched and under-theorised (Erben, 1999). Authorities such as Cuban (1986;
1993) and Beatty (2003) have pointed up that innovations in CALL multimedia have
not always been perfectly integrated into classroom practice, for various reasons
including problems with the installation and technology itself, ideological factors,
classroom conditions, cost and teacher training.

This paper will present an ongoing case study to examine the theoretical,
methodological and pedagogical issues which have arisen from the installation of
computer-based multimedia language learning environments in operation for the past
two years at the School of Languages and Area Studies, University of Portsmouth,
taking into account the five key factors outlined by Barr & Gillespie (2003) of
information dissemination, resource distribution, human resources, pedagogical
strategies and ideological and cultural context. The study is based on data collated in
several discrete stages from both teacher and learner users over a period of two years
from 2003 onwards. The results and conclusions arrived at thus far have been based a
study of various focus groups drawn from cohorts of MFL and EFL students and
interviews with teachers.
 LEARNER STRATEGIES WITH MULTIMEDIA
APPLICATIONS: IDENTITY, AGENCY, AUTHORSHIP
Margaret Anne Clarke and Rose Clark
The University of Portsmouth

The purpose of the present study is to perform an illuminative, integrative and

summative interpretation of changing modes of student authorship through a survey
of EFL and MFL learners in an integrated multimedia-supported digital classroom
over the period of one academic year.
Use of multimedia CMCs can be analysed in relation to the changing “landscape of
communication” (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 1996) and other ongoing debates about
repertoire multiliteracies, and the influence of new technologies on multiliteracies
(Kress, 1995;Tweddle, et al, 1997). The study will focus particularly on changes in
modes of writing and the shifts from traditional narrative and descriptive genres to
genres more closely related to issues of personal identity as the students construct
meaning via the use of multiple hypermedia functions within open-ended classroom
situations, through peer tutoring and other collaborative methods in the classroom.

In the first part of the paper, I examine the theoretical framework supporting genre
theory with particular reference to what Threadgold (1994) terms a ‘multifunctional’
approach to genre theory. This takes account of the dynamic ways in which genres
are ‘performed’ in practice and applies them to the practice of language learning
through the affordances and resources offered by multimedia digital applications,
which are not viewed as links or means for conveying information, but rather as
“thinking devices” used to generate new meanings in a collaborative setting (Lotman,
1988).

The study itself consists of a content analysis of data collected through several
sources throughout the academic year 2004-2005: the reflective comments of a class
of 25 students of EFL in learning journals maintained weekly; the direct observation
of students’ classwork by the tutor; and weekly discussions with a focus group
consisting of 10 students.
 THE KNOWLEDGE, PRACTICE AND OWNERSHIP OF GENRE WITH
MULTIMEDIA DIGITAL APPLICATIONS
Margaret Anne Clarke and Rose Clark
University of Portsmouth
The purpose of the present study is to perform an interpretation of modes of student
authorship within an integrated multimedia-supported digital classroom over the
period of one academic year. The paper will focus on student learners’ use of
multimedia applications as “genre participants” and “genre producers” and the
processes and stages undergone as they construct meaning via the use of multiple
hypermedia functions and affordances within open-ended classroom situations, for a
number of communicative purposes and within a range of selected intercultural
themes and contexts.
According to Threadgold (1999) the theory and rhetoric of genre has been applied to
other semiotic media, including multimedial and digital. The students’ dynamic use
and exploitation of multimedia resources and their available generic knowledge not
only responds to rhetorical and discursive contexts, but may also create, innovate and
develop new generic forms to achieve novel communicative goals; according to the
framework outlined by Bhatia (1999) student authors may often pass through
progressive stages of genre knowledge and practice to attain the competence of “genre
ownership”, that is, the capacity to create hybrid or mixed generic forms, embedded
genres or sometimes, novel generic constructs in order to attain what Kress (2003)
terms a multimodally constituted message.
Thus the paper will test the theory outlined by Bhatia through a content study of data
collected from several sources throughout the academic year 2004 – 2005, including
direct observation of selected course material, the students’ classwork and their use of
hypermedia functions in open-ended classroom situations; and weekly discussion with
a student focus group.