Recent Changes

Language Literacies and Multiple Literacies
Being in a Kindergarten practicum classroom this year has given me a unique opportunity to observe multiple literacies in students who are not yet developed in their written language. Instead, these students rely on other forms of literacy to communicate their ideas and knowledge. I have found it a very welcome challenge to attempt to assess the students on their learned knowledge of a subject area within the Manitoba curriculum through creative forms and multiple literacies instead of written forms. This has allowed me to see literacy in a new way and recognize that communication can happen in many ways.
showcase their individual way of knowing and making sense of information.
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Being in a Kindergarten practicum classroom this year has given me a unique opportunity to observe multiple literacies in students who are not yet developed in their written language. Instead, these students rely on other forms of literacy to communicate their ideas and knowledge. I have found it a very welcome challenge to attempt to assess the students on their learned knowledge of a subject area within the Manitoba curriculum through creative forms and multiple literacies instead of written forms. This has allowed me to see literacy in a new way and recognize that communication can happen in many ways.
One thing that I have noticed during my time in the classroom is that not all students respond through the art forms of drawing, painting or other such art forms. I think that is an important reason why incorporating multiple literacies is so important in the classroom to reach all students. The two illustrations below show two students representations of two types of trees (deciduous and coniferous) as we learned that they look in the winter. However, for one student who's literacy language is not art it is very unclear what the student had learned. Through discussion with this student I found that they had learned and understood in the same capacity as the student whose art portrayed their understanding. The important aspect that I took from this is that while students should be encouraged to try many types of literacies it is important that we as teachers are assessing our students in ways that best showcase their
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Return to Art and Literacy

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Return to Art

Language Literacies and Multiple Literacies
Being in a Kindergarten practicum classroom this year has given me a unique opportunity to observe multiple literacies in students who are not yet developed in their written language. Instead, these students rely on other forms of literacy to communicate their ideas and knowledge. I have found it a very welcome challenge to attempt to assess the students on their learned knowledge of a subject area within the Manitoba curriculum through creative forms and multiple literacies instead of written forms. This has allowed me to see literacy in a new way and recognize that communication can happen in many ways.
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ReturnOne thing that I have noticed during my time in the classroom is that not all students respond through the art forms of drawing, painting or other such art forms. I think that is an important reason why incorporating multiple literacies is so important in the classroom to reach all students. The two illustrations below show two students representations of two types of trees (deciduous and coniferous) as we learned that they look in the winter. However, for one student who's literacy language is not art it is very unclear what the student had learned. Through discussion with this student I found that they had learned and understood in the same capacity as the student whose art portrayed their understanding. The important aspect that I took from this is that while students should be encouraged to try many types of literacies it is important that we as teachers are assessing our students in ways that best showcase their
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{PC090100.jpg} Return to Art

The work I have done with students in a grade 5 classroom at Ecole Riverbend has opened my eyes to how to effectively use multiple literacies and art to foster an emergent curriculum. I was amazed at how much the students learned through our mural making process, both about our Aboriginal focus, the creative process and themselves. This really impressed upon me the strength that the emergent curriculum can bring to student led learning and I saw how engaged and interested students could be when given the freedom to choose their own learning path. Even while working within a Manitoba curriculum area the students were allowed to select their own subject for their group mural and worked collaboratively to investigate their subject further in order to represent it through mural. This experience taught me how valuable student directed learning can be in engaging students in their learning. Not only that, however, but it also taught me how capable and creative students can be when they are allowed to take control of their own learning.
It was in this setting that I really came to understand what it means to have multiple ways of knowing. I found that during our mural making process I always had my own understanding of what we were doing and of what the finished product would look like. I was continually impressed by the insight of the students' new ideas and visions that I had not seen. I made a personal discovery that I am too used to there being a "right" answer and that I haven't been as open in the past as I could or should have been to others ways of knowing. One particular example of this that stands out for me was one group's decision to build their mural as a three dimensional model from the ground up (as pictured below) instead of as a wall hanging with some three dimensional aspects. My first reaction to hearing their idea was "no, you can't do that!" but when I really questioned "why not?" I found that it was my own perspective of what I believed to be the "right" way which kept me from initially accepting this new idea. Once I stepped back and thought about it I realized that just because it wasn't something that I thought was a possibility did not mean that it shouldn't be done, and when the group had completed it I also saw in the mural what their initial vision had been. I think that multiple literacies opens the realm of creative possibility by eliminating that one "right" answer and allowing for much more variety and student led (emergent) curriculum. After all, variety is the spice of life!
through this experience that multiple went beyond GardinersGardiner's multiple intelligences can be tiestied to Vygotsky's
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The Arts in Emergent Curriculum
The work I have done with students in a grade 5 classroom at Ecole Riverbend has opened my eyes to how to effectively use multiple literacies and art to foster an emergent curriculum. I was amazed at how much the students learned through our mural making process, both about our Aboriginal focus, the creative process and themselves. This really impressed upon me the strength that the emergent curriculum can bring to student led learning and I saw how engaged and interested students could be when given the freedom to choose their own learning path. Even while working within a Manitoba curriculum area the students were allowed to select their own subject for their group mural and worked collaboratively to investigate their subject further in order to represent it through mural. This experience taught me how valuable student directed learning can be in engaging students in their learning. Not only that, however, but it also taught me how capable and creative students can be when they are allowed to take control of their own learning.
seen. I discovered in myselfmade a personal discovery that I used to theirthere being a that I probably haven't been I could (or should)or should have been ways of knowing things.knowing. One particular this that sticksstands out for was one groupsgroup's decision to as a wall hanging for the wall with some
I found through this that multiple ways of knowing went beyond Gardiners multiple intelligences to a basic fundamental way of thinking and knowing that can be ties to Vygotsky's theory of construction of knowledge. Vygotsky's theory states that "our specific mental structures and processes can be traced to our interactions with others" and that "these social interactions are more than simple influences on cognitive development - they actually create our cognitive structures and thinking processes" (Woolfolk et al, pg. 39). I feel that I have now seen this in action in the classroom through this experience in mural making.
{Riverbend_047.jpg} {Riverbend_046.jpg}

The Arts in Emergent Curriculum
The work I have done with students in a grade 5 classroom at Ecole Riverbend has opened my eyes to how to effectively use multiple literacies and art to foster an emergent curriculum. I was amazed at how much the students learned through our mural making process, both about our Aboriginal focus, the creative process and themselves. This really impressed upon me the strength that the emergent curriculum can bring to student led learning and I saw how engaged and interested students could be when given the freedom to choose their own learning path. Even while working within a Manitoba curriculum area the students were allowed to select their own subject for their group mural and worked collaboratively to investigate their subject further in order to represent it through mural. This experience taught me how valuable student directed learning can be in engaging students in their learning. Not only that, however, but it also taught me how capable and creative students can be when they are allowed to take control of their own learning.
of the students ofstudents' new ideas orand visions that
I found through this that multiple ways of knowing went beyond Gardiners multiple intelligences to a basic fundamental way of thinking and knowing that can be ties to Vygotsky's theory of construction of knowledge. Vygotsky's theory states that "our specific mental structures and processes can be traced to our interactions with others" and that "these social interactions are more than simple influences on cognitive development - they actually create our cognitive structures and thinking processes" (Woolfolk et al, pg. 39). I feel that I have now seen this in action in the classroom through this experience in mural making.
{Riverbend_047.jpg} {Riverbend_046.jpg}

The Arts in Emergent Curriculum
The work I have done with students in a grade 5 classroom at Ecole Riverbend has opened my eyes to how to effectively use multiple literacies and art to foster an emergent curriculum. I was amazed at how much the students learned through our mural making process, both about our Aboriginal focus, the creative process and themselves. This really impressed upon me the strength that the emergent curriculum can bring to student led learning and I saw how engaged and interested students could be when given the freedom to choose their own learning path. Even while working within a Manitoba curriculum area the students were allowed to select their own subject for their group mural and worked collaboratively to investigate their subject further in order to represent it through mural. This experience taught me how valuable student directed learning can be in engaging students in their learning. Not only that, however, but it also taught me how capable and creative students can be when they are allowed to take control of their own learning.
came to knowunderstand what it
I found through this that multiple ways of knowing went beyond Gardiners multiple intelligences to a basic fundamental way of thinking and knowing that can be ties to Vygotsky's theory of construction of knowledge. Vygotsky's theory states that "our specific mental structures and processes can be traced to our interactions with others" and that "these social interactions are more than simple influences on cognitive development - they actually create our cognitive structures and thinking processes" (Woolfolk et al, pg. 39). I feel that I have now seen this in action in the classroom through this experience in mural making.
{Riverbend_047.jpg} {Riverbend_046.jpg}