The potential of collaborative drawing for literacy engagement and identity affirmation in multilingual settings: Guidance for practice and research

Abstract

In this article we explore multimodal communication, specifically drawing in a team, as a tool for literacy engagement and identity affirmation. For this, we developed and trialled collaborative drawing (CD) activities to engage 9 children and 8 adults in non-verbal and verbal communication. We collected photographic, video and audio data which we analysed using an exploratory approach, incorporating thematic analysis. Current research on collaborative drawing does not consider literacy engagement, identity affirmation or how teachers could use this communication method to engage diverse learners, and our study contributes to this gap. Our findings suggest that the CD approach has potential to facilitate literacy engagement and identity affirmation in multilingual settings, but its application in classrooms also has its challenges. This article, thus provides guidance for teachers with an interest in exploring collaborative drawing in practice, and it prepares the ground for further research in this this underresearched field.