She describes an activity in which she had students bring in visuals of their research (pictures, graphs, signs, etc.). The students then created visual maps of their research, though they were required to try several configurations before gluing the visuals on the paper. Then, students “read” each other’s maps and discussed these readings with the author. The purpose of this activity was to help students notice connections and relationships in their research that they could not see in an alphabetic mode.
She also offered her students the option of creating an alternative text for the research paper. She emphasized, however, that “changing form should not compromise content” (189). Only a few students took this opportunity. She concludes that her vocabulary had pushed students toward more traditional texts. “Without the visual vocabulary – I include both the words to talk about the visual elements and the elements themselves – text remained privileged in the reports and in the ways students worked with their data” (198). Both students and teachers need this vocabulary. In addition to vocabulary, visuals need to be represented in a teacher’s daily pedagogy. Kinnear states, "It was and remains my responsibility to develop and use multimodalities in my teaching, in the way I present and develop ideas in the classroom. The deliberate inclusion of visual elements in both the way material is presented as well as in assigned 'readings' and eventually the assignments students must complete may make a difference in the way students respond to and make use of activities such as the research visualization exercise" (201).
Kinnear writes the following about mediation:
“Vygosky argued that human experience is always mediated. It may be mediated by signs, tools, or experiences. Signs and tools are developed and produced by people. These can be both material and symbolic. The symbolic tools include languages, symbol systems such as numbers, musical notation, formal aesthetic principles, and various writing systems and image. With regard to reading and writing, material tools can include various writing implements, computers, brushes, inks, paper, and books” (183-4). “The language(s) an individual has access to mediates the meaning he or she attempts to make and it is only in this mediated process that the thought is realized, that meaning is made. That meaning takes a form in words, sentences, a discourse, or in a visual grammar and syntax” (183-5). “[W]riting is a socially meaningful activity that depends on the relationship between the individual and the social context(s) the individual participates in…mediated by both material and symbolic means” (187).
Key Term
- Hypermodality: “Hypermodality is more than mutli-modaltiy in just the way hypertext is more than plain text. It is not simply that we juxtapose images, text, and sound; we design multiple interconnection among them, bout potential and explicit” (concept by Lemke 200).