Are we really literate?

The way people communicate is changing due mainly to new technologies, and to shifts in the usage of the English language within

different cultures. These days, text is no longer the only and main way to communicate. Text is being combined with sounds and

images, it’s being incorporated into movies, billboards, almost any site on the internet, and television.

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All these ways of communication require the ability to understand a multimedia world so English, and actually all subjects, should evolve to help students develop the skills they need in the modern multiliterate society. Some of the skills they need are…

The New London Group (1996) proposes the teaching of all representations of meaning including, linguistic, visual, audio, spacial, gestural, and multimodal through a balanced

classroom design of Situated Practice, Overt Instruction, Critical Framing and Transformed Practice. Students need to draw on their own experiences and semiotic

literacy practices to represent and communicate meaning.

Situated Practice

Inmersion in experience.

Overt Instruction

Explicit teaching.

Critical Framing

Explaining purposes.

Transformed Practice

Applying new knowledge. Adding meaning.