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

The merging of production roles and availability of modes afforded by the facilities
of the medium of computers may as Sinker suggests have an impact on the
boundaries of school knowledge.

In this thesis I explore the kinds of mode and the range of modes made available in
the technologies of different media and the configuration or design of the interaction
between modes. The interaction of image and writing on screen is explored in a
number of ways. This includes analysis of the percentage of the screen allocated to
each mode, the compositional position of each mode, the links made between image
and writing, and the meanings that each mode realises.

The Potential for Interactivity

Examining the options available to the user of a computer application enables the
potential for interactivity to be analysed. Here the focus is on what resources for
action the user has, what can be altered, re-made, edited and when these options are
made available and when they are not. The analysis of student interaction explores
when and how students engage with these potentials. This includes the limited
interactivity of a CD-ROM in which the user can shape a text through its reading,
through the order it is read in, and the elements selected or by passed. As well as the
interactivity offered by a computer programming application in which the user can
import images and sounds to bring together a range of objects and behaviours to
construct a game. ‘Interactivity’ broadens the possibilities for inter action in the shift
from book to screen.

The computer screen, unlike the cinema screen or (until very recently)
the TV screen, is a surface of reading∕reception and of
writing∕production.

(Bum and Parker, 2002)

With the book the reader cannot write back, and the reader cannot modify the text in
any way other than in inner interpretation. The facilities of computer technologies

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