“Sometimes, I Just Go on a Pinning Spree”: How One Middle Schooler Negotiates Multimodal Platforms

Abstract

AbstractCommunication is the result of meaning making based on one’s frames of knowing. For students, those frames of knowing derive heavily from multimedia communication, including social networking sites, that allow them to be the makers of content. In this study, I followed an eighth‐grade student who fluidly negotiated a multitude of available social technologies, integrating them in unique and personal ways to help her attain deep and complex literacy levels. Of significance is that her engagement with these literacies was done in ways invisible within school settings and could easily be unseen, overlooked, ignored, or undervalued, failing to reveal an accurate depiction of her literacy knowledge and skills. I used the multiliteracies’ concept of design to frame the study, and I provide suggestions for educators to better identify unobserved literacy practices.