Mixed-Media Poems: Boy Writers Discover Personal Voice in Vibrant Pages

• In Event: Millennium Hotel Roundtable Session 6
  In Roundtable Session: Expanding Modalities for Critical Engagement: Contemporary Research in Multimodal Composing

Abstract

In this three-month qualitative study, 38 boys in grades 5, 6, 7, and 8 were invited to write nine identity-focused poems from idea bundles that they created from a variety of visual/print media (i.e. photographs, magazines, art, and newspaper) that was organized on three tables: vibrant; monochrome; and mixed. The purpose of the study was to investigate how different visual and verbal media support students in their efforts to write poems with particular attention to how color and the absence of color impacts writing. 1,675 media were collected; analysis of 312 idea bundles, poems, and accompanying questionnaires suggest that idea bundles provided a meaningful pathway for supporting students’ efforts to write vivid and descriptive poems.

Author

• S. Rebecca Leigh, Oakland University