About this research

The researchers and teachers of digital technology and of English and literacy in senior primary and junior secondary schools are developing new digital multimodal authoring pedagogies integrating coding and computational thinking in the regular English curriculum.

Teachers and students in the project are using the ‘Scratch’ coding software to create animated micro-narratives that are about one or two minutes in duration. The learning experiences address specific curriculum requirements in English and digital technology.

Teachers participate in workshops with the researchers for about 90 minutes a week over a school term advancing their experience of coding and computational thinking with ‘Scratch’. They then focus on relating coding to multimodal authoring and teaching programs.

After joint preparation for the classroom coding animated narratives program by the teachers and the researchers, the program is implemented in classrooms in the second term. After a third term review and analysis of the program outcomes, a follow-up coding of animated narratives program occurs in the fourth term.

Examples of student produced animated narratives will progressively appear on our gallery tab. News about student learning, teachers’ experiences of the program and new developments will appear in the ‘What’s New’ tab. Publications and presentations about the project will appear during the next three years.

As a key life skill and a national curriculum requirement, engagement in digital and multimodal literacies and in coding and computational thinking in the middle school years enriches learning and provides skills that support future workforce innovation and productivity.