Kayla' Blog Week 7-11

  Critical Media Literacy   Through exploring this week's readings, I was interested in understanding the importance of meeting the needs of children in the classroom by exploring content that was relevant to them and how this supports learning. Pennel et al (2018) demonstrate just how important it is that children are supplied with resources (books) that portray their abilities/disabilities in an acceptable and understanding way suitable for all reading levels, for the purpose of raising awareness of the diverse needs, interests and children in classroom settings. This was something that she felt was not done well enough by authors or the book world. Through this discovery, it was brought to my attention just how crucial this is for children and their learning, as well as self-view and value. Likewise, Callow (2017) explored a similar topic, exploring the importance of understanding texts and their ability to explain a valuable storyline or link to real-life events and what t...

  Visual Literacies My comment on the value of digital games and stories that are produced as adaptations of literature begins when understanding the points made in the lecture by Forrest (n.d.), who explains the importance of images and books, including those that have no words. From this knowledge, I can determine the importance of images not just in books but in any context and the role they have in understanding a situation and experience. The connections were made between the telling of the story through characters' eyes, positions, shape, size, etc, (vector, gaze) as well as the physical elements of the image (colour, salience) these explain the importance of the physical picture that can be seen to the eye, and supports young children to see the message of images and understand context (text to world/text/self) (Forrest, n.d.). Callow (2016) explains the quality of exploring many books, titles, and authors to extend their visual literacy and language and exploring the multim...

 Materials, Virtual Worlds and Making (Image of a character I created for this week) (OpenAI, 2023) Through interacting with this week's character activity, it was evident just how many different ways the internet can be used to make characters. For my specific character, I used ChatGPT. I made this decision based on my interest in this app. Based on this result, it would be simple to create settings and stories, using many applications or internet resources. However, when using these kinds of opportunities, children need to understand the importance of creating their own work and ideas and that this is not a solution for all tasks, but rather a support for ideas, examples and learning opportunities. Abrams (2017) demonstrates a crucial way that digital materials can be used to build children's literary skills through emotions. Anita demonstrates a stronger understanding of explaining her emotions when doing it through the Minecraft character and while engaging in something of ...

  Textual Repertoires and Literacy Learning An app that I chose is TikTok. TikTok is a social media app that makes videos, sounds, and visual elements that can be shared with viewers, providing information or entertainment. This is an app I enjoy using. I enjoy the practicality it has on my life and the way that the content relates to things that I am interested in, and the way that I have learnt so much from this one app. I also enjoy its use of videos and multimodal functions that can support making/watching videos on the app. The purpose of this app is to provide enjoyment, knowledge and a connected community of viewers, therefore creating a world of knowledge through one particular app.  According to Burnett & Merchant's (2018) definition of mode, I understand that this particular app is 'multimodal' in that it allows listening, watching, and viewing (mode) to images, videos, and sounds (media) while interacting with it, and that this is also the app's purpose (...

   The Changing Nature of Meaning Making 10/09/2025 (My own image taken of my laptop) The selected image directly links to task one. It demonstrates the shift in device use over the years. In my earlier years of schooling, I primarily used pencils, paper, and only written/paper books when engaging with reading/writing in a school setting. Using electronic devices such as a computer, laptop or iPad was seen as a treat and something that happened very rarely, as they were not readily available to everyone due to cost, and weren't crucial to learning. However, by the end of my schooling experience, I had finished most assignments and exams using this laptop.  Through the years, I have not only developed suitable literacy skills for understanding/comprehending how to use a device for these tasks, but I have also transferred knowledge to be able to write assessments using a keyboard and touchpad/mouse compared to a pencil at the beginning of my schooling. Therefore, I have not...