The Trashmaster: literacy and new media

Language and Education have just published my paper 'The Trashmaster: literacy and new media' which is an attempt to turn the tables on the whole disadvantage debate. I argue that schools are failing students by not providing them with the skills to negotiate the new media environment. I use an analysis of the Trashmaster machinima to explore the literacy practices that are associated with new media and then bemoan the fact that children and young people are not provided with tools that might help them to produce and consume in these textual environments effectively or critically. I'm sure friends and colleagues will point out its shortcomings, but from my perspective, I wish I'd had enough space to put this analysis alongside some extracts from curriculum documents. That would sharpen the argument - I don't know, maybe there's a chapter to be written from that. Going forward from that there is a complexities paper with my colleague Cathy Burnett (that's very exciting) and then I'm sketching out a first piece on very young children and their interactions with iPads. Somewhere, also, swishing around in virtual space is a book chapter written with Julia Davies which looks at digital literacy and teacher education, drawing on the work of the Deft project. Plenty of writing....and then there's the day job!