Young students’ uses of visual composing resources in literacy classroom contexts: a cross-case analysis

Abstract

In this study, the author draws upon a social semiotic framework, exploring the ways in which students can use visual semiotic resources while composing texts in literacy classroom contexts. His multi-case study involving three cases of students in primary-level classrooms focuses specifically on how several focal students created, accessed, and assembled sets of visual semiotic resources that they used while engaged in the literacy processes at hand. This study defines and develops the concept of a visual composing resource, and qualifies the range, scope, and type of visual resources that were available to the students while they engaged in literacy processes in various classroom settings. The author also illustrates how the students brought these sets of visual composing resources into a complex interaction with the semiotic assemblages that they were producing in each context, revealing important aspects of early literacy processes that incorporate visuality.