Multimodal/Cinematic Journal
The digital Multimodal Journal (MJ) plays a fundamental role in the R@W system of learning. It is a digital multi-page document where an individual learner creates his or her space to reflect the process of knowledge generation. We can think of every page as a frame for a reflection of the metacognitive processes of the learner, and the whole document as a mind-cinema projection.
On the Multimodal Communication page, we define mind-cinema as what we ‘see’ and ‘experience’ in our minds. In our mind-cinema, we remember or imagine in a variety of forms, which may include words, images, sounds, smells, touch, tastes, and sensations of different physical states such as body temperature, balance, feeling sick or happy.
To reflect such multisensory processes of the mind, we use the method of cinematic writing. That is, embodying the thoughts and feelings—giving them a body—through the use of text, images, sounds, animations, photos, videos, etc. This is what we call ‘writing with images, sounds, and movements’ or cinematic writing. The journal can also be referred to as a cinematic journal (CJ).
There are a few software applications that can be used for the CJ. However, in R@W, we use the Figma app. Here are the reasons why we feel so strongly about this particular platform:
- It is important for the people in the group to use the same software so the problems of transferring data are avoided;
- Figma is a free online platform to create, collaborate, prototype, and handoff.
- Figma is enabled with a multi-page function;
- Figma accommodates the use of various media: graphics, photo/audio/video modes of expression;
- Figma can be easily and at any time converted into presentation mode for sharing ideas.
- Figma components are easily transferable on the Internet.
CJ is the cinematic projection of an individual learner becoming an individual agent. It is a digital game-field where learners learn to express their implicit mind-cinema for their own observation without fear of doing anything wrong. Learners find their individual ways of letting their thoughts come out on the pages of the CJ by developing their own systems of symbols and manner of expression. Thus they create an effective system for making and conveying meaning.
The implementation of CJ and cinematic writing is what fundamentally distinguishes the R@W model from all other innovative models of learning of which I am aware. Using this technique, you can make your thoughts and feelings ‘perceivable’ for sharing, expansion and refinement—ultimately for all-round learning.
Mara Green is one of the students in a learning group working on an insect project. As a result of watching a few videos on YouTube and undertaking some preparatory research on the Internet, the students became quite fascinated with butterflies.
The first page of Mara’s CJ is a reflection of the generation of the initial data.
Multimodal/Cinematic Journal Example
Learning Project: The Mystery of the Scaled Wings
The purpose of this example is to illustrate the use of a CJ.
I am not setting up a specific task based on the year level or curriculum requirements.
I’m trying to make it as generic as possible.
Mara is a natural artist and photographer.
To create a sense of being inside the CJ, she asked her sister to take photos of her and used clear-cut images of herself throughout.
She uses PP animations to apply movements or transition effects and see her images come to life when she presents her ideas to others.
The group was absolutely captivated by the wings of the insects.
Wings of butterflies are actually transparent but covered in colorful scales that create a visually stunning pattern.
Mara created some images illustrating her fascination with this fact. She placed the butterfly’s wings, where the pattern serves as a device to protect the insect from their predators, on her face as a mask, and also made them into a skirt, as if putting herself inside the ‘butterfly skin’. Taken with the delicacy of the colorful patterns, she also cropped the image of a wing and turned it into a dress. Mara is a passionate artist and spends time doing observational drawings of the wing patterns and the scales. This activity made her more and more fascinated with their patterns. It also made her notice things she wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.
Totally mesmerized, Mara couldn’t stop drawing and observing. The activity made her wonder how it’s possible for the patterns on the wings to be so masterfully created by perfect organizations of tiny scales. As she observed them through her drawing, she noticed that if the scales on the a wing differ from others in color, they also differ from others in shape. Mara began to wonder why this is so. She looked for the answers on the Internet but found none. What she found, though, was that there was a researcher at Orange University, in the same city where Mara lived, who specialized in studying butterfly wings—Dr Truden.
Mara had a meeting with her learning group, where they were encouraged by the R@W coach to reach out to the people who are professionally engaged in studying or working with butterflies. That’s how Mara decided to call Dr Truden.
Dr Truden was very interested in the project Mara and her group were working on and agreed to see the group and answer their questions. Excitedly, Mara and the others in the group worked on the questions they wanted to ask Dr Truden. Mara also asked people in the group to ask their parents to help them organize their trip to Orange University.
This description of Mara’s use of CJ could be continued, but what we see in these initial pages is Mara learning to be her own agent in producing knowledge.
Let’s assume that organizing the trip didn’t work out well because none of the parents could take them to the meeting and they were advised against going there alone. At the same time, a boy in the group, named Rich, organized a trip to a butterfly farm. Although a meeting with Dr Truden was held through Zoom, the students didn’t get an opportunity to see butterflies’ wings through the ‘miracle’ microscope Mr Truden had in his laboratory, but Mara still felt that it was much more important to the topic of their project than the visit to the farm. But people in the group praised Rich for organizing the trip and ignored Mara’s efforts. How did Mara cope with this—in her view—unfair situation? She wrote about it in her journal and, taking the R@W coach’s advice, thought about it seriously. This is where the expansion of knowledge about a subject and the development of life-smart skills, such as collaboration and communication inter-ripple in one all-round system of learning.
We can assume, since the trip to Orange University didn’t work out, that Mara started looking at how and where the group could get butterflies’ wings and the equipment to pursue their data collection.
On the next page of the website, the Detective’s Wall, I would like to continue the story of Mara and her learning group, The Mystery of Butterflies’ Wings project. We will imagine how the project might unfold and how the Detective’s Wall component is inter-rippled with the use of CJ.
If you are interested in how cinematic journals can be implemented in your own teaching practice, join our Ripples@Work_Pedagogy course to develop your individual approach.
