Language Learning with Multimodality

According to Street (2008), literacy was viewed as a static, cognitive/psycho-linguistic approach that admits the existence of a specific set of skills and competencies that should be mastered by learners regardless of the context. However, this view has changed rapidly due to the developments in Information and Communication Technologies. From a socio- cultural perspective, literacy is viewed in terms of the dominant social practices and the new technologies used by people in everyday life, and thus schools or classrooms are perceived as interactive units in society (Abdallah, 2010). As a result, the concept of literacy has been pluralized (i.e. literacies) to encompass the many forms and variations that emerged with these new technologies (Abdallah 2008). The term multiliteracies was coined by the New London Group (1996) when developing a model to frame contemporary literacy practices. In this approach, reading, writing, and communication on the Internet may be viewed a set of ‘multiliteracies’ which emerge when individuals from different cultural contexts encounter one another within different communication technologies (Abdullah, 2010).