This article offers a multimodal analysis of spontaneous, improvisatory interactions between pre-service teachers as they engage with a range of material resources connected to, or generated by, a literary text (in this case, the Old English poem Beowulf). We draw on an understanding of role as a form of frame, offering students a particular…

In this article, we offer an account of a two-day workshop conducted with a group of postgraduate English and Drama student teachers, part of a larger AHRC-funded research project. Our focus is on reading and the reception of a canonical text, in this case Beowulf. We argue that taking a transmedia approach helps learners to think about the…