011. Stein & Tan's readings and how it relate to Singapore

From Stein & Tan's articles, I understand that meaning making is not limited to language alone. Instead, using multimodal pedagogies, meaning can be derived through the different modes. Also, the use of multiliteracies pedagogies in our classroom can help to bridge the differences between students of different cultural and linguistic abilities.

Most mainstream schools in Singapore have students of varying abilities. The continuum ranges from students who can read and write beyond their age of development to students who can barely recognise the letters of the alphabet. For some, this continuum can exist in a classroom. However, having low linguistic abilities do not mean that a student is unable to make meaning or understanding. For example, a low ability student who is presented with the movie 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' (which has been adapted from a book) with subtitles may not be able to read the subtitles or the book itself but he/she is still able to make meaning of the content through the visuals and audio presented in the movie. Thus, the adoption of multiliteracies in our local classrooms may then help to bridge the differences in abilities. This means that teachers should explore the use of images, video, audio etc in their lessons, beside the traditional written form.

However, I also note that the current school system is examination-based, which means that students still have to be able to make meaning through printed text and express themselves through written text. Therefore, we also need to question that though multiliteracies is beneficial in the literacy development of our students and that the education system is slowly moving into this area, how well do we prepare our students with varying linguistic abilities for the examinations they face each semester. Unless the mode of assessment changes, I suspect that the teaching and use of multiliteracies in the classroom will not be fully embraced by teachers and parents.