Jody Shipka "A Multimodal Task-Based Framework for Composing"

In Shipka's essay, she examines a task-based multimodal framework for composing. By providing examples of various projects and students' work, Shipka shows the benefits in allowing students to set their own goals to structure the production, delivery and understanding of the work they accomplish. I was impressed by the calibre of work Shipka described these students producing under such 'goal directed' assignments, particularly in relation to her OED project, where students were asked to research the origin of a word and then tell the story using different modes. One student, Prakas Itarut turned in an envelope containing a floppy disk, ( yes, some of the examples were a little dated), and set instructions for how the audience should read the his work on the word "scare." The directions explained that the reader should read this work alone, in the dark, while watching the floppy disk, which consisted of ghostly images and haunting music Such creative examples which are provided throughout the essay perpetuate the point that "students have a much richer imagination for what might be accomplished in the course than our journals have yet even begun to imagine, let alone address"( 282).

Since this is the article I will be using to lead my graduation class in discussion Monday, I began thinking about interactive ways I could foster a framework to discuss a multimodal-task based assignment. At the end of the article, Shipka returns to a point Yancey makes in her address, "namely that the development of a new curriculum for composition will likely involve a new vocabulary, a new set of practices, and a new set of outcomes" ( 301). As I think about bringing the innovative ideas we have been discussing in my class this summer to my administration, I see I will need a clear definition for many of the terms that have become commonplace in my own vocabulary over my summer. Therefore, in class on Monday, I hope to provide the space for my classmates and I to bring light to many of these terms under "goal-directed multimodal task-based framework" ( 302).