Given the challenging depth of queer theoretical concepts, this article argues that one of the most effective ways to teach the complexities of queer theory is by utilizing comics in the classroom. I focus on how college-level instructors can use the content, form, and history of comics to teach students how to enact and do queer theory. By…

The ways in which teachers adjust to challenges in the process of becoming professionals are complicated. Teacher mentorship, however, is an important step to creating and sustaining a strong professional career. This article discusses new understandings from a Canadian research project: "Pedagogical Assemblage: Building and Sustaining…

Understanding basic human anatomy can be beneficial for all students, regardless of when, or if, they will later undertake a formal course in the subject. For students who are preparing to undertake a formal anatomy course, educational comics on basic anatomy can serve as a concise and approachable review of the material. For other students, these…

In our contribution we focus on the possibility to use an educational tool called Concept Cartoons in future primary school teachers' education, as an instrument for observing how future primary school teachers reason about fractions. In the introduction section we present Concept Cartoons, and also the primary school level of the fractions topic.…

Context: Visualization as a multi-modal process is widely explored in curriculum studies. I examined a facet of how people learn to participate in visualization practices that remains under-studied in preschool and post-secondary settings: moment-to-moment agency while in unfamiliar socio-cultural realms. I conducted a thirteen-month ethnography…

Although the implementation of multimodalities in education is much lauded by education research, the educational value of such formats is uncertain for education stakeholders. This study relied on the use of focus group interviews and field notes to better understand how a group of middle school students felt about their graphic novel reading…

Comics--both digital and print--increasingly make their way to the classroom. Scholars in the field have illustrated the pedagogical value of comics, but there remains little discussion as of yet about how comics can inform critical literacy, a necessary skill for twenty-first-century communication. Here the authors discuss an approach to…

To further students' understanding about gravity, forces, and motion, multiple types of text were integrated into instruction. As part of a 5E lesson (Bybee et al. 2006), the authors used a selection from Capstone Press's Graphic Science series, "A Crash Course in Forces and Motion with Max Axiom" (Sohn and Barnett 2007) to support…

This article is an exploration of the varying applications of comics and cartoon art as primary resources and pedagogical tools within the university setting. Following some background information on cartoon art forms including early American newspaper comics, nineteenth century humor serials, political cartoons and manga, the article explores how…

Two literacy teacher educators charged with teaching literacy to preservice elementary teachers discovered the potential of graphic novels for supporting multimodal comprehension and Internet navigation among students. Reviewing their adopted texts, they found almost nothing about graphic novels and questioned whether this was the case in other…

The contribution investigates opportunities that an educational tool called Concept Cartoons can offer in future teachers' education, namely in comparison with word problems in standard written tests. The referred empirical study was conducted in two separated consecutive stages, with two groups of future primary school teachers (the first one…

This essay describes an adaptable, multimodal assignment in which students create a comic in lieu of a traditional essay or exam. I outline the theoretical and practical value of this assignment and provide a detailed description of its implementation in two different literature courses: an introduction to the major course and a course on…

Lesson study is a form of professional development where a group of teachers identifies a problem of practice on which they would like to make progress in their teaching. Over an extended period of time, the teachers study the topic and plan a lesson together. One member then teaches the lesson while the others observe; the group reflects…

Past studies have shown that multimodal presentation of story can improve story-retelling performance in the first language. The purpose of the present study was to investigate whether similar multimedia effects can be observed in second language learning and graphic novel reading. A total of 51 Chinese elementary school children, aged 7-8, who…

Despite the prevalence of educational apps for children, there is little evidence of their effectiveness for learning. Here, children were asked to learn ten new words in a narrative mobile game that requires children use knowledge of word meanings to advance the game. Study 1 used a lab-based between-subjects design with middle-SES 4-year-olds…