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ERIC Number: EJ816648
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2008-Nov
Pages: 10
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0360-9170
EISSN: N/A
Literacy in Motion: A Case Study of a Shape-Shifting Kindergartener
Siegel, Marjorie; Kontovourki, Stavroula; Schmier, Stephanie; Enriquez, Grace
Language Arts, v86 n2 p89-98 Nov 2008
This article presents a case study of a kindergarten girl from a Bangladeshi immigrant family who demonstrates her multiliteracies as she negotiates the multiple demands of the mandated literacy curriculum. The case is drawn from a year-long ethnographic inquiry of the literacy practices and cultural models in a balanced literacy curriculum where digital and print-based literacies intersected. Drawing on theories of discourse, multimodality, and positioning, the multi-level analysis shows that the child's literacies and social positionings were constantly in motion as she designed texts and her identities across writer's workshop and computer lab. She fluidly combined linguistic, visual, and bodily resources to design meanings on pages and screens, but her literacies were not easily captured on a printed page and thus she was not recognized as a successful in writer's workshop. In the computer lab, however, her multimodal literacies were more visible and she became someone with knowledge and skill who could act as tutor, friend, and successful literacy learner. The case suggests that the shape-shifting literacies and identities of a child considered "at risk" remain largely unseen in a monomodal, monolingual, and monocultural literacy curriculum.
National Council of Teachers of English. 1111 West Kenyon Road, Urbana, IL 61801-1096. Tel: 877-369-6283; Tel: 217-328-3870; Web site: http://www.ncte.org/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: Early Childhood Education; Elementary Education; Kindergarten
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: New York
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A