In Japan during the 1980s, there was an interesting debate about how to teach the area of a parallelogram effectively to primary school children. Yutaka Saeki criticized the standard method, which relies on a cut-and-paste procedure. He argued that the standard method inevitably failed to convince children because it does not provide any cogent…

Children's literature is increasingly being realized in app format, with its possibilities of combining text, music, sound effects, stills, animated movies, verbal language and, not least, interactivity. This digital and medial literary development calls for new analytical approaches to explore its manifestation in children's literature--its…

Natural materials provide children opportunities for artistic engagement, which encourages a dialogue between children and material and provides a platform for children to discuss their perspectives on significant issues like sustainable futures. This article examines the land art characters created by pre-primary education children in the garden…

While much existing work on digital storytelling with young people has focused prominently upon presenting their own personal narratives and viewpoints, relatively little attention has been given to learning that could arise from digital adaptations by young children of existing and well-known stories. This article reports work exploring learning…

This article explores the significance of students' encounters with materiality in general and with crafting materials in particular when learning for sustainability. The aim of the explorative study is to illustrate a research approach that can show what students and the material do in correspondence and what stories emerge from this activity. An…

Background: Identity provides a useful conceptual lens for understanding educational inequalities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). In this paper, we examine how paying attention to physical and digital 'materiality' enriches our understanding of identity work, by going beyond the spoken, written and embodied dimensions…

This paper focusses on the forensic work put on display at Londres-38, a building in Santiago Chile designated as a National Monument, which once functioned as a torture and extermination centre under Pinochet's dictatorship. Striving to avoid conventional memorial practices, or didactic strategies that would morbidly represent the past horror,…

Our current cultural moment requires reflective urgency. COVID-19 has forced a collective pedagogical confrontation with new media's materiality, and how such materiality intersects with, for example, the public speaking traditions within introductory communication courses. While COVID-19 has spotlighted online-only educational conversations, our…

Background: With a growing new materialism paradigm and research on multimodality, there is an increasing attention on the role of material objects in science teaching and learning. However, there is currently no available framework, coding scheme, or method of inquiry to specifically analyze the use of material objects in science meaning-making.…

This article shows how language materiality is conceptualized through an ethnolinguistic analysis of the representation of the owl as an indication of human-bird relationships. This approach enables addressing the multiple relations between birds and speakers and their perception of the environment as these are reflected in language, folklore and…

Background: Fiber crafts occupy a vital position in technology innovation and present a promising space for computer science education, which continues to face lopsided participation. It remains unclear whether and how fiber crafts can become a context for computational learning and what role different materials play with the risk to miss…

In this study, we argue that touch is a way of producing gender in preschool and our aim is to explore different kinds of matters that intersect with gendered touch practices in this context. Our theoretical starting points draw on the performativity of gender and the discursively constructed touch practices of early childhood educators. We…

This article focuses on the concept of "letter" in oral folklore. The main research material is examples from the older folk songs of Seto, where a letter, a book and other items referring to literacy are mentioned. Texts under consideration are poetical and the meaning conveyed in them is not always very clear. The term…

The article aims to develop a theory of biographical knowledge and practices of aesthetic articulation. Thus, it examines the aesthetic practices of young people beyond their verbal utterances. Using seven video case studies, it demonstrates the extent to which biographical knowledge is articulated in aesthetic practices -- drawing, dancing,…

The author explored the literacy practices in tabletop gaming communities. Focusing on the role of spatiality and materiality in nondigital contexts, this study broadens how literacies research engages with sociocultural analysis of primarily analog settings. Building on experiences in playing the role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, the…