Enhancing Language Experience Through Digital Literacy and Popular Culture

By Dr. Leslie Haas and Dr. Jill Tussey

Language Experience is an educational approach associated with student experiences expressed through reading, writing, listening, and speaking (Hall, 1970). Student artifacts are then used as instructional supports for literacy development. This traditional academic approach is uniquely personalized and has a strong foundation for reinvention by moving outside the academic setting to support student learning as they consume, create, and share literacy experiences in a variety of digital formats. These formats embrace a variety of learning styles and can be both collaborative and independent while highlighting student literacy encounters and expressions based on popular culture. These may include fanfiction, movies, podcasts, social media, television, and video games. By embracing language experiences within students’ cultural context, educators have the opportunity to develop true culturally responsive pedagogical practices.

Fanfiction is when writers utilize characters and plotlines from original work with a fandom base and modify them by developing new relationships between characters, extending plot and timelines, creating new settings, and exploring novel themes (Jamison, 2013). One way to incorporate this type of creative writing into K-12 classrooms is by using popular culture narratives as mentor texts. Mentor texts take the full cognitive load of creation off students and allow for focused attention on one particular aspect of writing. For example, when a popular comic book is chosen as a mentor text, students can focus on developing the point of view of a less developed or minor character without also needing to focus on setting and plot. This type of support can be particularly advantageous for English Language Learners because mentor texts can offer quality examples of dialog, imagery, sentence structure, etc.… within the context of the chosen genre.

Movies are typically characterized as stories represented through recorded images, movement, and sound to entertain or inform (Computer Hope, 2020). Incorporating movies into literacy classrooms can take on many forms. One form is the exploration setting as an integral part of storytelling. For example, students can select, analyze, and discuss a movie scene, then collaboratively develop a script for the same scene within a different setting. Questions for students to consider during development could center on the changes to characters' dialog, relationships, and reactions based on the setting.

Embracing digital literacy embedded in popular culture is one way to motivate students in an academic setting. Respecting language experiences students engage with outside the academic setting provides educators a window into student lives. Making connections with students and the culture in which they identify can be a powerful bridge between teaching and learning. This bridge provides a way to honor student literacy experiences both inside and outside the academic setting.

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