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New literacies, globally popular among children and adolescents in and out of school contexts, are challenging educators and institutions to rethink pedagogies. As educators begin to embrace the pedagogical possibilities of multimodal texts and digital practices, they are exploring the complexities of assessing these new literacies. The essays in this book explore what it means to assess the sophisticated textual engagements of new literacies, including reading and writing online, social networking, gaming, multimodal composing, and creating virtual identities. Chapters offer practical examples of new literacies, and examine how assessment provides insight into the diverse ways in which language is conceived, valued, and used to inform the literate lives of its twenty-first century users. Scholars and educators will find this collection full of rich understanding of the assessment concerns raised by new communication practices, youth culture, digital engagements, and semiotic diversification.
List of contents
Contents: Anne Burke/Roberta F. Hammett: Introduction: Rethinking Assessment from the Perspective of New Literacies - Eve Bearne: Assessing Multimodal Texts - Anne Burke: Checkmarks on the Screen: Questions of Assessment and New Literacies in the Digital Age - Maureen Kendrick/Roberta McKay/Harriet Mutonyi: Making the Invisible Visible: Assessing the Visual as Spaces of Learning - Margaret C. Hagood/Emily N. Skinner/Melissa Venters/Benjamin Yelm: New Literacies and Assessments in Middle School Social Studies Content Area Instruction: Issues for Classroom Practices - Jennifer Rowsell: My Life on Facebook: Assessing the Art of Online Social Networking - Jill Kedersha McClay/Margaret Mackey: Distributed Assessment in OurSpace: This Is Not a Rubric - Kay Kimber/Claire Wyatt-Smith: Valued Knowledges and Core Capacities for Digital Learners: Claiming Spaces for Quality Assessment - Richard Beach/Linda Clemens/Kirsten Jamsen: Digital Tools: Assessing Digital Communication and Providing Feedback to Student Writers - Roberta F. Hammett: New Literacies and Teacher Education - Julian Sefton-Green: Epilogue.
About the author
The Editors: Anne Burke is Assistant Professor of Literacy Education in Curriculum and Teaching at Memorial University in Canada. Her recent research focuses on adolescent literacy and social practices, new literacies with a focus on digital reading, and assessment of new literacies in the contexts of school and out-of-school settings. She has published in a wide range of journals such as JAAL, Changing English, and E-Journal and recently published two educational texts for literacy at-risk youth in the area of popular music and performance.
Roberta F. Hammett, Professor of Education at Memorial University, is co-editor of Boys, Girls, and the Myths of Literacies and Learning (2008), Teaching English Today: Advocating for Change in the Secondary Curriculum (2004), and Digital Expressions: Media Literacy and English Language Arts (2002).
