comparison between the printed text and the narrative film

Firstly, two versions of the transmedia text, namely the printed text and a narrative film, were utilised to help students make comparisons between the affordances of the two text-types and the meaning-making potential of the modes they support. A narrative film was chosen because it is a more complex multimodal text which allows students to consider how the dynamic combination of the semiotic modes of moving image, audio, spoken language, space, and gesture to convey meaning. 

In addition, it has been argued that the comparative analysis of various versions of a transmedia text can enhance our students’ appreciation of literacy and promote critical multimodal literacy (Djonov, Tseng & Lim, 2021). When the students make comparisons between the printed text and the narrative film text, they are given the opportunity to navigate the affordances and limitations of each of the representations.

As part of situated practice in the Learning by Design Framework, the tuning-in activity allows the students to experience the known (building on their prior knowledge of the printed text version of “Wonder”) and the new (unfamiliarity of the narrative film version of “Wonder”), where the teacher will assist them by providing necessary scaffolding in the form of guiding questions. The use of an authentic text will also strengthen the connection between theory (the strategies learnt to analyse a narrative film) and practice (applying these strategies to analyse narrative films that they view outside of the classroom) (Cope & Kalantzis, 2015b).


DEVELOPING the STUDENTS' UNDERSTANDING OF A NARRATIVE FILM TEXT

As an extension of the Learning by Design Framework with pedagogical features of the systemic functional approach (Lim, 2018), the teacher will facilitate the acquisition and understanding of the film text genre through 1) Form, 2) Engagement, 3) Message and 4) Integration (Lim & Tan, 2018), in which 4) Integration will will be covered in Lessons 2 and 3. 














For the segment on form, the students will be explicitly taught what a narrative film is and the structure of a narrative film – exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, resolution (Bennett, 2013), which is similar to the narrative plot structure that they frequently apply in their writing. The other types of film texts will not be taught due to its complexities. Through explicit instruction and by focusing only on narrative films, it would provide the students with a more targeted and in-depth understanding of the genre of a narrative film. 

Before the teacher moves into the segment on engagement, the teacher briefly recaps the different semiotic modes with the students and facilitates a discussion about how the different semiotic modes present in the film text influence their interpretation of the character’s traits. Through the use of questioning, which is a strategy under the dimension of overt instruction, students are guided to understand how the visual, spatial, audio and gestural semiotic modes are used to enhance the effectiveness of moving images. This lesson package is streamlined to focus on the media strategies of mood, intimacy, music and involvement, which ties in with the visual, spatial, audio and gestural semiotic modes. This is so that the students can learn to probe deeper beyond what they see visually. The teacher will explicitly teach the students the media strategies (mood, intimacy, music and involvement) to ensure that they are equipped with the appropriate meta-language to talk about how these elements convey meaning in narrative film texts. 

Thereafter, the teacher will guide the students in the analysis of a short segment of the narrative film “Wonder”. Having learnt the meta-language, it encourages talk in the classroom, where students are expected to respond to the thinking questions using the appropriate meta-language. It should also be emphasised that there are no "right" or "wrong" interpretations because students should not be fixated on arriving at the "correct answer" but instead, rely on their visual and aural senses to view the narrative film text critically.

In the last segment of this lesson, students are tasked to think about the possible reasons why the producers wanted to create this narrative film. This helps them in perspective-taking, where students are given the opportunity to step into the producers’ shoes to consider the intended message and the context of production (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2001).