Seminars by Professor Jackie Marsh
Jackie Marsh is a Professor of Education at the University of Sheffield, UK. Her research focuses
on young children's digital literacy practices and the relationship between play, literacy and
children's cultures. She has conducted projects that have explored children’s access to
technologies in homes and their emergent digital literacy skills, knowledge and understanding.
She has also undertaken projects in early years settings and primary schools focused on the
development of appropriate curriculum and pedagogy for the digital age. Jackie is an editor of the
Journal of Early Childhood Literacy.
Seminar - Reflections on researching with children
Abstract: In this seminar, Professor Marsh will draw on her studies of young children engaged in
the use of media and technologies, conducted over the past 15 years, to reflect on some of the
methodological and ethical issues raised when working with children of this age. The seminar will
consider the approaches that might be drawn upon in order to engage children as active
participants in the research process in studies of media use, and will also reflect on
methodological challenges in the study of online practices.
Date
Wednesday, April 23rd 2014 – 1pm – 3pm AEDST
Friday Research Conversation - From the whip and top to the Wii:
Play, media and commercial culture from the 1950s to the present day
Abstract: This presentation reports on a project funded by the British Academy, which examined
changes in the way in which media and commercial interests have influenced children’s play over
the last 60 years in the UK. The UK has unique collections of children’s playground games and
rhymes. The folklorists Iona and Peter Opie collected children’s playground games and rhymes in
the 1950s -1970s and their collection is deposited at the Bodleian Library. The project involved
interviewing some of the Opies’ child contributors and their contemporaries, now adults aged 5065, about their memories of play and its relationship to media and commercial markets. Their
experiences were compared to those of contemporary children in a study funded by the AHRC as
part of the Beyond Text programme, ‘Children’s playground games and rhymes in the new media
age’ (2009-11). The presentation will outline the continuities and discontinuities identified in the
relationship between play, media and commercial culture over time. Changes in the way in which
children are positioned in commercial markets over the past sixty years mean that play has
become embedded within a range of media and artefacts. Contemporary children are more
spatially restricted in their play than children in the 1950s – 70s, but they have a wider repertoire of
media and technologies from which to draw in their play in creative ways. The implications for
future research on play are considered.
Date
Thursday, 24 April 2014 – 4pm – 6pm AEDST
Seminar: Digital Futures: Learning and Teaching Literacy in the New Media Age
Abstract: This presentation draws on the ‘Digital Futures in Teacher Education’ project,
undertaken in the UK, in order to reflect critically on the teaching and learning of literacy in the new
media age. The nature of young children’s engagement with new media outside of school is
examined initially in order to set the context for the subsequent analysis of classroom practice.
Focusing on children aged from birth to eight, the way in which many children are competent users
of a range of media in homes and community settings is explored. The presentation then moves
on to analyse the classroom practice of kindergarten and primary school teachers involved in the
‘Digital Futures in Teacher Education’ project, in order to identify the aspects of curriculum
provision and pedagogical strategies that enabled them to build effectively on children’s out-ofschool practices. Key principles that should underpin literacy learning and teaching approaches in
the digital age are outlined.
Date
Monday, 28 April 2014 – 9am – 11am AEDST
Rooms for all events
Melbourne 5.30
North Sydney Level 16 TWH Building
Brisbane AC.22
Strathfield VC Room (E2.45 Room)
Canberra 110
Ballarat 503
For enquiries please contact ana.mantilla@acu.edu.au