remix

Multimodal Writing

December 5th, 2009  •  Posted by English 579: Computers & Writing  • 

To keep pace with advancing technology, writing courses at NMSU must move beyond traditional alphabetic texts. Even though such texts, with solitary and individual writers are still the most common choice at the university level, the rest of the world is rapidly changing. Multimodal tools, such as wikiboards, facebook, blogs, twitter, and more, are communicative media, both in and out of classrooms and employment settings. Multimodal composition assignments provide students the skills necessary for creating and interpreting the many different contexts of reading and writing taking place within our technology-based world beyond the university.

< p>By encouraging multimodal composition we can instill students with the tools needed for success in their chosen fields of study and beyond. Students who experience a multimodal collaborative composition assignment as part of their studies will be provided with hands-on knowledge of utilizing an important tool for communication in today's society. One great resource is Multimodal Composition, (edited by Cynthia Selfe) which has a multitude of assignments and thoughtful justifications. Writing New Media (by Anne Wysocki, Johndan Johnson-Eilola, Cynthia Selfe, and Geoffrey Sirc) is a book that often practices its own calls for non-linear multimodal texts and is a further resource with classroom ready assignments and scholarly rationale. These works focus on the growing importance of technology and digital composition in the world outside of the academy.

However, multimodal writing satisfies the objectives of English 111 here at NMSU. These objectives, while specific to our first writing course, are directly informed by the State's Common Core Competencies for Communications (see the page "Why assign collaborative writing?" for a discussion specific to those objectives).

For more information, please explore the following link:

NMSU Objectives Satisfied by Multimodal Writing