A Multimodal Framework for Computer Mediated Learning: The Reshaping of Curriculum Knowledge and Learning

consequence it fails to attend to the effect of the resources of the screen on the character
of students’ engagement with the screen. By contrast the focus of social semiotic
research in the domain of new technologies is on the resources of the screen (as a ‘text’)
and rarely moves beyond the screen to analyse students’ interaction with it. From both of
these perspectives the simultaneous focus on the representational means of the screen and
the interactions of students with each other and with the screen are not brought into the
analytical frame to the extent that they are in this thesis.

In collecting the data I used two cameras to focus on the ‘plane’ of the screen and the
‘plane’ of the classroom, in particular the students’ engagement with the screen. The
language of description developed in the thesis applies to both ‘planes’ of activity, and is
used to analyse two forms of (interaction simultaneously. I treat the multimodal
configuration of elements on the screen as complex sign of the application designer(s)’
construction of curriculum knowledge. Alongside this, the students’ multimodal
interaction with the screen (their gestures, body posture, talk and so on) is treated as a
multimodal sign of their engagement with the curriculum knowledge represented on
screen. This offered a way to examine their transformation and production of knowledge.
I transcribed and analysed the multimodal construction of signs in relation to both of
these planes, focusing on how each mode and the relationships between modes realised
ideational, interpersonal, and textual meaning in relation to the curriculum. This dual
focus on the multimodal resources of the screen and the students’ interaction is a new
development within multimodal research that enables the interconnection of the resources
of screen and the practices of students to be explored in detail. By focusing on both the
representational resources of the screen and the practices of the students the thesis was
able to broaden the analysis to look at the ‘social’ effects of new technologies and the
multimodal character of the mediational means on learning.

Epistemological Issues and the Relationship between Representation and Realism

In this section I discuss some epistemological issues raised by the multimodal
representations of the curriculum knowledge in the three examples drawn from the
subject areas focused on in the thesis, English, Mathematics and Science. I take as my

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