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Background: In South Africa, developing criticality among learners is essential for their careers in school and outside school. However, knowledge and understanding of critical literacy within the schooling context is unclear, with only patchy guidance available for teachers. Objectives: An intervention project was set up to discover how community signs could be used as a pedagogical tool for teaching learners to be critical readers. The focus of the study was teaching English second language learners to use language as an instrument for creative and critical thinking. Method: In this 'study within a study', the learners' role has been elevated to that of researchers. As 'researchers', the learners collected community signs from around their township and conducted interviews with community members. They analysed the signs and interview transcripts using Fairclough's method of critical discourse analysis. The social semantic theory was used to anchor this study. Results: The first attempt at being critical readers was the categorisation of data. Three categories that formed broad themes were observed. The learners' responses gave insight into their own 'processes' of reception and processes of production of the signs. The results suggest learners developing an ability to read signs as instantiations of township discourses. Conclusion: Teaching critical literacy awareness can be achieved when teachers use texts drawn from familiar contexts. The study contributes to knowledge on how unconventional texts can be used in the classroom to develop criticality among learners.

In this study, pictures drawn by primary school students about noise were analyzed semiotically. The study was carried out with 20 primary school student volunteers. Research data are the pictures drawn by the children and semi-structured interview records. From the analysis of the students' drawings, three main themes, namely "visual indicator", "sign", and "symbol" are identified in this paper. The reasons for the noise in the school are depicted quite well in the student pictures; noise is reflected as a phenomenon that is disturbing, destructive, threatening physiological-psychological health, and negatively affecting social life and learning in school. However, paintings also showed that the children perceived sound and noise as the same concept. Students identified calmness in the classroom with the teacher. Findings suggested that activities should be included to improve the sound and noise awareness of the students at the school, initiate awareness in a school of silence as a shared social value, and physically improve school acoustic quality.

The world is familiar with Chinese wine but neglects its attractive partner, Thumb Fight ([foreign characters omitted]). The Thumb Fight is a precious traditional Chinese drinking game. However, its rare research still focuses on its history, not the translation process during its dynamic playing logic. The semiotic is access to logic from Peircean. The translation process during Thumb Fight can be developed under the guidance of translation semiotics. This article analyzes the Thumb Fight playing process's signs translating process based on the translation semiotics with Peirce's triadic sign relations. All sign interaction is translating from translation semiotics in the broadest sense. The significant signs involved in translating are thought signs, finger signs, and oral signs. The article starts from a single player's side to divide its translation sign system into three stages: opening ceremony, fighting progress, and winning result. Furthermore, to better understand its dynamic competition process, the article constructs a translation conceptual framework to analyze its signs translation, with the signs-objects-interpretant triadic relations. In the following standard case study, the theoretical analysis framework of translation semiotics can effectively show the process and behavior of signs translation.

The aim of this research is to propose indicators of epistemic and mediational suitability to assess tasks designed in a mobile learning context, using theoretical and methodological elements of the onto-semiotic approach (OSA) and the SAMR model (substitution, augmentation, modification, and redefinition). With these indicators, 110 tasks designed by two Mexican teachers are evaluated, for the teaching of the natural number in primary education. Some results indicate that the situation-problems addressed the meanings of numerical sequence, operational, ordinal, and measure, and that 56% of the tasks were located at the substitution level. Some implications derived from the research are that the mathematical content can be complemented by including other representations of the natural number and that the design of tasks that are positioned at the modification and redefinition levels should be encouraged. The foregoing serves as a basis for the design and assessment of mobile content for the natural number concept.

Effective learning is viewed as an evolutionary process, and as such, it involves an expanded version of the Crenshaw-Collins view of "intersectionality." It demands an in-depth view of the complex socio-cultural-ethnic milieu in which students are embedded. Even more, effective learning requires effectance problem-solving, investigation and semiotics, along with effectance motivation, to form a quadripartite framework for effectance holism, which becomes the foundation for equity. Equity in the classroom requires shared human experience, research, process, ideas, as well as product. Effectance motivation associates walking, awareness, attention, perception, thinking and adaptation to one's environmental conditions that encourage effective, competent interactions of students with their surroundings. Arguably, effectance, rather "effective," motivation is evidentiary in childhood development, and is responsible for acquisition of increased intellectual awakenings in the home and in the classroom. However, effective motivation alone is self-limiting. I include effective problem-solving, investigation and semiotics into the equation. That students are active, constructive participants in the learning process is also evidentiary. With Susan Harter effectance motivation encompasses the developing intellect of children and evolution of their independence, mastery, competency and success. Against this background of scholarship research, Gardner's "multiple intelligences" portray student success and motivation as a pathway "only" to stereotypical roles, without any educational value. In contrast, "egosystem" provides a viable framework for understanding students and their complex makeup. In fact, I argue that frames of reference should replace "frames of mind." In terms of the value of learning through the arts, early modernism, especially Dada and surrealism, have inspired students to reimagine their own art as having not only intrinsic aesthetic value, but also extrinsic narrative value as social-political commentary. Essentially, art and design education must reimagine what students "could" do, if only they did not have to conform to a set curriculum, and were allowed to research art history on their own, explore their personal passions and experiment with various art forms.

Many pragmaticists claimed that pragmatics developed mainly from 1970s and 1980s, taking the emergence of its series of pragmatic theories (e.g., Cooperative Principle, Conversation Implicature, Relevance Theory, etc.), methodology, and the official issue of "Journal of Pragmatics" (1977) in Amsterdam as its marks. However, few scholars reinstate the historical truth of the real development of pragmatics by comparing and reviewing the semiotic thoughts between Peirce and Morris so as to discover the development and prosperity of pragmatics in Morris's times (around 1930s). As one of the founders of modern semiotics, Morris's major contribution derives from his proposal of trichotomy theory of semiosis, that is, syntactics, semantics, and pragmatics, grounded on which Morris intends to establish an all-inclusive general theory of signs. Substantially, Morris's semiotic theory involves rich pragmatic thought which is inherited and developed from Peirce theory of signs that has logic and pragmaticism as its foundations. This paper aims to reveal the formation and development of pragmatics in Morris's behavioral semiotics by means of comparing the semiotic thoughts between Peirce and Morris from the perspective of dynamic history. Specifically, this paper involves the analysis of the philosophical foundations of pragmatics, disciplinary classification, the establishment of pragmatics, theory of sign inquiry, the relevant specific semiotic views, and three semiotic dimensions of Morris's pragmatics, which are conducive to explore the pragmatic origin and development from the perspective of Morris's semiotic thoughts. As such, Pragmatics in Morris's behavioral semiotics is established and developed in a systematic and formal way.

This article investigates how linguistic landscapes (LLs) can foster critical thinking about linguistic power relations and tensions in multilingual areas by acting as stimuli to reflect on the ethnolinguistic vitality of languages in a given region. We examine the pedagogical use of LLs as resources for the implementation of plurilingual pedagogies in mainstream secondary school classrooms in two distinct sites: Germany and the Netherlands. Data was collected through classroom observations, interviews with teachers, and students' assignments and questionnaires. Analysis included an examination of how students validate their linguistic and semiotic practices and those of the Other through different approaches to LL in the classroom. Results show that in the Netherlands, students and teachers co-constructed the research on LL by critically reflecting on visibility issues in their LL research; in Germany, students and teachers engaged in collaborative sequences of meaning-making based on preselected examples of the LL of their surroundings. In both sites, teachers' attitudes were central in fostering classroom interaction to enhance students' reflexivity and criticality. This study is significant as it confirms the added value of using LLs as resources for developing critical language awareness through challenging "banal monolingualism" in highly linguistic diverse classrooms and as a path towards empowerment.

Drawing on findings from an ethnographic study of the writing practices of three plurilingual writers in Toronto, Canada, this article focuses on the translingual practices that these writers engaged with and discusses how these practices enriched their writing processes and products both in English and in their mother tongues. The author explains how these writers' translanguaging was a complex process with five dimensions: (1) lexical, (2) syntactic, (3) rhetorical, (4) conceptual, and (5) presentational (how to present, share, and disseminate text). The article highlights how translanguaging contributed to the participants' larger semiotic engagements. Moving beyond the formulations of semiotic agility as a technical skill, the author explains how translanguaging helped the writers maintain their writing identities by creating semiotic and semantic continuity in their writing trajectories.

The objectives of this study are to investigate verbal and visual semiotic resources employed as well as the cultural aspects embedded in the online soft drink advertisements. The data of this study was selected from the U.S. official soft drink brand Coca-Cola Instagram account (@cocacola), and a total of 58 advertisements were analyzed. Three analytical frameworks were employed to analyze the data. First, Nilsen (1979)'s phonetic devices framework was used for verbal resources analysis. Second, Kress & van Leeuwen (2006)'s and Harrison (2008)'s social semiotics frameworks were adapted for analyzing visual resources. Third, Hofstede et al. (2010)'s cultural dimensional model was employed to discuss the cultural aspects in the advertisements. The analysis of the verbal resources in the advertisements reveal two types of phonetic devices: alliteration and assonance. For the visual analysis, the advertisements tend to use the brand's color, red, instead of a logo to make the brand memorable. The representative participants (RP)' positions and gazes also give the sense of equality between the viewers and the brand. Most of the advertisements use visual resources that complement the verbal resources in order for the advertisements to be coherent as well as being able to convey the embedded cultural aspects. Two cultural aspects out of six were found: masculinity and indulgence. In addition, the study also found religious aspects embedded in the data.

This paper contributes to the contemporary focus on literacy and digital stories in early childhood education and care (ECEC) institutions. When a group of young children create an animated story together, they might collaborate, both with their peers and with their teacher. By drawing on social semiotic multimodal perspectives as the theoretical framework, the purpose of this paper is to describe and explore how different modalities and narrative devices contribute to the development of an animated story created by six children (aged 4-5 years) and a teacher in collaboration. The study is a qualitative case study, focusing on contemporary events in a Norwegian kindergarten. The empirical material consists of video-recorded field observations of the process as well as the final product. Through an inductive exploration of the development of verbal narrative, three analytical strands are identified: (i) verbal narrative in the final product, (ii) multimodal narrative in the final product, and (iii) narrative devices applied by the children during the process. The findings demonstrate the importance of including and considering the process, the product, narrative devices and all the modalities--in particular the kineikonic mode--when creating an animated story with young children. An implication of these findings is for ECE teachers and researchers to acknowledge and integrate all the various aspects that contribute to the final product when young children create animated stories.

This research discusses language ideologies in Amazigh/Berber in Morocco. It analyzes Amazigh activists' views on the process of Amazigh standardization, including dialect unification, script selection and reclaiming of Amazigh identity. Drawing on findings in the study of language ideologies and discourse analysis, this paper examines interviews with activists and demonstrates a connectedness between participants' conceptions about language and their embodied actions. It also reveals ideological assemblages, in which conflicting language beliefs and practices are bound together. Through examination of the ideological divide on Amazigh language and script, the study shows how verbal and nonverbal actions iconically index aspects of Amazigh language ideologies, including linguistic purism, manifested through intricate forms of recontextualized lexical items, embodied gestures and voice features. The participants' linguistic and non-linguistic practices provide insight into particular identity dimensions and complex social relations. The indexicalities of their utterances, which will be analyzed discursively, are better understood not only through consideration of the various semiotic resources such as embodiment, but also through discussion of specific histories of political and linguistic conflicts. The study as a whole relies on an interdisciplinary method to emphasize the political nature of language standardization and demonstrate the significant role of embodiment in language ideological research.

The theoretical reflection on the nature of school algebra and the development of algebraic thinking from the first educational levels is a relevant topic in mathematics education. In this paper, we first summarize and clarify the positions held on this topic by two theoretical frameworks: the Theory of Objectification and the Onto-semiotic Approach. We identify concordances and complementarities in the respective conceptions of algebra and of the processes of developing algebraic thinking, as a result of applying these frameworks to analyse some students' responses to a task on numerical patterns. We also analyse and compare the didactic models proposed in both theoretical frameworks for developing algebraic thinking. The analysis of the algebraic thinking and learning episodes is also used to illustrate a general discussion on the identity and boundaries of these theoretical frameworks and the possibilities of coordination and integration.

We present a theoretical study that allows us to attempt framing in an embodied perspective the effectiveness of the drawing robot GGBot in the learning of geometry. The aim of the article is to set the intertwining of activity, semiotics, perception, and knowledge at the crossover of Radford's theory of objectification (TO) and Borba and Villareal's notion of humans-with-media. Such a crossover is articulated in four building blocks: (1) processes of objectification and the role of semiotic means of objectification, where we state that digital artifacts such as the GGBot change the topology of the semiotic means of objectification; (2) cognition is sensuous and learning is a process of domestication of the eye, where perception is theoretically shaped by the interaction with GGBot; (3) GGBot and humans-with-media, where we outline new thinking collectives and their modes of activity; (4) domestication of the eye triggered by transitions between domains of activity. Each building block of our theoretical discussion is empirically anchored to four episodes involving primary school students' learning geometrical figures using the GGBot. To conclude, we focus on two basic concepts of geometrical thinking that unfold in the shift between domains.

In many advanced mathematics courses, comprehending theorems and proofs is an essential activity for both students and mathematicians. Such activity requires readers to draw on relevant meanings for the concepts involved; however, the ways that concept meaning may shape comprehension activity is currently undertheorized. In this paper, we share a study of student activity as they work to comprehend the First Isomorphism Theorem and its proof. We analyze, using an onto-semiotic lens, the ways that students' meanings for quotient group both support and constrain their comprehension activity. Furthermore, we suggest that the relationship between understanding concepts and proof comprehension can be reflexive: understanding of concepts not only influences comprehension activity, but engaging with theorems and proofs can serve to support students in generating more sophisticated understanding of the concepts involved.

This study aims to explore a teacher educator's perceptions and practice of translanguaging in his education classrooms as a teacher of English as a medium of instruction (EMI). Adopting a qualitative case study approach, the research revealed that the teacher educator used three translanguaging strategies (i.e. integrating academic discourse with everyday discourse, linking verbal and other semiotic resources, and using students' first language) to create a 'translanguaging space' in his EMI classrooms for content teaching and learning. The findings also showed that the teacher educator's translanguaging practice was both planned and generative, depending on his situated teaching context which presented him with various teaching opportunities and challenges (e.g. students' resistance and university policy). The study highlights the importance of teacher educators' reflective practice in their execution and improvement of translanguaging practice in EMI classroom settings.

The purpose of this study is to investigate what semiotic analysis can reveal about how welcoming and inclusive a science library space is for patrons. A space was examined in terms of its messaging to patrons of various genders, abilities, races, ethnicities, nationalities, and disciplines. Findings are presented about the space's messaging regarding the disciplines it serves, inclusion of patrons from minoritized demographics, and general expectations of visitors. Recommendations for library practice and future research are discussed.

Recent reform efforts state the importance of providing students with opportunities to persevere with challenging mathematics to make meaning. We posit translanguaging practice as a vital option by which Latinx bilingual students can sustain collective perseverance during problem solving. In this paper, we employ a constant-comparative overlay analysis to simultaneously study the discursive translanguaging and perseverance practices of Latinx bilingual students and the corresponding classroom supports. We observed collaborative problem solving in two classrooms of 12th-grade Latinx bilinguals working to make sense of an exponential function and the involvement of the same monolingual English-speaking teacher. Working within similar, supportive classroom environments, we describe how one group of students spontaneously and dialogically leveraged communicative resources to help persevere with in-the-moment obstacles, while another group of students worked together across languages but did not engage in a translanguaging mathematical practice to persevere. We suggest that only establishing a classroom environment conducive for translanguaging and perseverance practice is insufficient and that teachers should not solely rely on students spontaneously engaging in these practices. To complement this environment, we recommend specific teacher moves and scaffolds that could help Latinx bilingual students initiate collaborative translanguaging and support their ongoing perseverance to make meaning of mathematics.

Most temples throughout Thailand have mural paintings upon their inner walls. Founder of Silpakorn University, Prof. Silpa Bhirasri, highlighted 13 temples in Thailand as having exceptional mural paintings. With its original Lanna Mural paintings, Wat Phumin in Nan is one such temple. These mural paintings depict three stories: the Buddha, the previous life of the Buddha and the ordinary lives of local people. In general, mural art is considered a medium designed to convey messages to the audience. Therefore, this study is designed to examine the capability of tertiary level students to comprehend the storytelling of the Lanna mural paintings at Wat Phumin. However, the target group of this study coincided with the data from the questionnaires which collected the data from a field trip onsite, which is tertiary education. Various methodologies were used to explore the comprehension of the storytelling of Lanna mural paintings among the tertiary students via Peircean visual semiotics. As a result, the report of this research has been shown in this study. Finally, the knowledge from this study can be used to enhance teaching in various education fields related to visual semiotics and mural paintings. In addition, due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, the volume of visitors to Wat Phumin has been reduced. As the situation gets better, this study can educate anyone who plans to visit this temple.

Conceptualization of foreign language teaching as a cross-cultural interaction means engaging learners in various cultural mediations. Language use becomes a form of interpretative architecture of a target language. Understanding language use from a discursive perspective develops meta-pragmatic awareness and interpretative capacities of learners. The study answers the question of how to design the architecture of context analysis. This research aims to determine the effective ways of interpretative engagement of learners with aspects of pragmatics in the Ukrainian university setting. The study investigates how the process of interaction shapes the engagement of learners in practices of noticing, reflection, and comparison of cross-cultural situations. The data came from a case study on cross-cultural language learning within the second semester, 2021. The study analyzes the audio-recording of the classes, researcher notes, and post-course interviews of 24 participants. This research used a method of the content analysis. The study of the results, based on six categories (narrative analysis, discourse analysis, semiotic analysis, interpretative analyses, conversation analysis, and critical analysis), showed that the learners started to consider the nature of their cross-cultural mediation. The research proved that through such an interpretative engagement, students become engaged into working with languages and cultures. The study presents some recommendations for language teachers to create a meaning-making process from multiple perspectives.

While digital multimodal composing, underpinned by a critical literacies approach, provides opportunities for students to make informed semiotic choices and voice concerns about social issues, there is limited research exploring how digital multimodal composing is employed to interrogate and challenge the entanglements of language, immigration status and power. This article explores how 23 primary-aged English as an Additional Language (EAL) students (Years 3-6) engaged in digital multimodal composing, in the context of an after-school multiliteracies programme in one Australian school. Conceptualising critical literacies as a bridge to access and transform codes of power, the article explores how the participating students selected and used different semiotic resources for their digital texts while challenging and redefining dominant discourses based on their lived experiences and interests. The study found that both students and pre-service teachers found value in students having access to digital technologies and experimenting with a range of multimodal and multilingual resources to create digital texts, which reflected cultural and linguistic identities. The findings illustrate how the creation of digital multimodal and multilingual texts allows for opportunities for students to reposition themselves as knowledgeable and active meaning-makers with strategic support from teachers and peers.

Recent studies in applied linguistics research have focused on how teachers draw on 'outside' knowledge relating to students' everyday life for the purpose of teaching subject matter content. This study focuses on such practices in the context of English-medium instruction (EMI) higher education in an online undergraduate chemistry module. Adopting an interdisciplinary perspective, the study combines multimodal Conversation Analysis (CA) and the Autonomy dimension of Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) to examine how one lecturer shifts between 'inside' knowledge of chemistry and 'outside' knowledge for a range of different purposes. Multimodal CA is used to carry out micro-analyses of epistemics and identity-related positioning in interaction, while LCT 'autonomy codes' are used to trace knowledge-building trajectories in which knowledge is positioned inside or outside the target topic and is used for different purposes. The analyses highlight how the lecturer skilfully deployed a range of semiotic resources in transitioning between 'inside' and 'outside' knowledge, and how these resources were leveraged for the building of disciplinary knowledge. Implications of this interdisciplinary approach for research and practice in university EMI contexts are discussed.

There is currently a lack of systematic study examining the integration of verbal-visual elements in science textbooks. In particular, few research has investigated how different types of visual representations (e.g. photograph, diagram, table) vary across the major written genres of science (e.g. information report, explanation). Based on the perspective of social semiotics, this paper aims to understand the co-dependency between visual representations and written genres by analysing a corpus of multimodal texts from a major Australian textbook series. Quantitative and qualitative analyses reveal a number of interesting patterns in terms of how several types of representations tend to appear with certain genres, as well as possible reasons for this co-dependency. In particular, the analysis accounts for why and how: (a) photographs and tables are used to support information report, (b) diagrams and photographs for explanation, and (c) diagrams and tables for experimental account. This study provides empirical evidence to support the importance of analysing multimodal genre for science teaching and learning as well as science education research.

The use of different registers to represent mathematical concepts enhances understanding. For example, rational numbers can assume pictorial, symbolic and natural language representations and this kind of change improves learning. Based on these assumptions, a teaching experiment for the learning of rational numbers by 2nd grade students was conducted, so as to allow for an understanding of how semiotic representations contribute to the learning of rational numbers, particularly with concern to unit fractions. Using a qualitative methodology and a content analysis of the students' written productions, the study shows a greater use of the pictorial representation register compared to the other types. Students' main difficulties in learning rational numbers are related to the pictorial representation of unit fractions and to an understanding of the concept of fraction itself. Some of these difficulties result from errors such as the misrepresentation of unit fractions in the case of the pictorial register, the association of the concept "half" with multiple unit fractions, the absence of the fraction bar when it comes to the symbolic register, the use of everyday terms to represent fractions when students rely on the natural language register, and the misrepresentation of rational numbers when the graphic register is used.

Civil engineers and project managers must control and manage the project management discourse with the client and other stakeholders or risk slippages to time, cost, and programs. This paper explores how communicative choices and the representation of project requirements and engineering issues are intrinsic to effective civil engineering work. Using a social semiotic framework, the paper contributes to civil engineering learning by revealing how various engineering communications (e.g., schematic drawings, visual images) function in civil engineering contexts. The research builds upon civil engineering communication scholarship, highlighting the significance of representational choices for affecting engineering work. The social semiotic and multimodal-informed analysis clarifies processes of cognition, interpretation, and understanding at play when civil engineers interact with project stakeholders. The findings inform civil engineering education and the teaching of communication skills: communication composition being intrinsic to effective civil engineering work.

Teaching and learning Calculus concepts and procedures, particularly the definite integral concept, is a challenge for teachers and students in their academic careers. In this research, we supplement the analysis made by different authors, applying the theoretical and methodological tools of the Onto-Semiotic Approach to mathematical knowledge and instruction. The goal is to understand the diverse meanings of the concept of the definite integral and potentials semiotic conflicts based on the given data. We focus attention on a first intuitive meaning, which involves mainly arithmetic knowledge, and the definite integral formal meaning as Riemann's sums limit predominantly in the curricular guidelines. The recognition of the onto-semiotic complexity of mathematics objects is considered as a key factor in explaining the learning difficulties of concepts, procedures and its application for problem-solving, as well as to make grounded decisions on teaching. The methodology analysis of a mathematical text, which we exemplify in this work applying the tools of Onto-Semiotic Approach, provides a microscopic level of analysis that allows us to identify some semiotic-cognitive facts of didactic interest. This also allows for the identification of some epistemic strata, that is, institutional knowledge that should have been previously studied, which usually goes unnoticed in the teaching process.

Language and literacy practices in teacher education are decisive in the education of future language teachers. In this article, I share my beliefs as a teacher educator about language and literacy practices constructed with teachers in Bogota. Thus, my intention is to weave my professional narrative through the connections I can make from theory and praxis to explain teachers' understandings of language and literacy through their life and literacy experiences and the way they organize their practice as language teachers. My research trajectory of thirty years documenting the local literacy practices within the research area of "literacy studies and local pedagogies for social transformation" has significantly informed my practice. University-school partnerships and international collaborations for research and teaching in Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Manchester, in the USA, and Dundee, in the UK, have nurtured me personally and professionally. My understanding of literacy as a social practice evolved to critical literacies and I developed knowledge in community pedagogies and city semiotic landscapes through reflections and collaborations via working with teachers. Community-based pedagogies (CBPs) invite teachers to see their life and work in relation to places they live and teach as meaningful content for linguistic, social, cultural, ecological, and economic resources to inspire students´ inquiries and teachers´ transformative practices. The city semiotic landscapes are powerful literacies for language learning; therefore, they currently adhere to the research group´s agenda (2019-2021). I describe my understandings, contributions, and suggestions as concerns in the field of teacher education in Colombia. My conclusions raise awareness about the need to address these topics in teacher education programs in Colombia.

The objective of this article is to identify the meaning attributed to the didactics of mathematics and what are the criteria with which an improvement in the teaching and learning process of mathematics is based, future teachers of mathematics, belonging to universities in three different countries (Brazil, Chile, and Ecuador). The qualitative analysis indicates that the majority of future teachers consider that the didactics of mathematics is a technical discipline that consists of providing strategies, resources, and procedures for teaching mathematics; few consider it as an art to teaching and almost none consider it as a scientific discipline that is concerned with studying the processes of teaching and learning mathematics. In addition, the results show that the criteria used by them, on how teaching and learning in this discipline can be improved, are focus, above all, in the cognitive, ecological, and emotional aspects and, to a lesser extent, to the interactional, mediational and epistemic. Finally, it is concluded that the improvement in teaching and learning is directly related to an improvement in the training programs of future mathematics teachers.

In "The Light of Day," Eric Ambler creates a dysphoric Istanbul through the opposition of East and West. However, its Turkish translation "Gün Isigi" by Adnan Semih Yazicioglu tends to create a very different narrative by transforming signs related to Istanbul and some Orientalist clichés. In this study, the image of the East as constructed by the West is analyzed through Edward Said's concept of "Orientalism" (1979). The novel is divided into segments to highlight the parts taking place in Istanbul, and the clash between East and West is analyzed through the concept of isotopy and the semiotic square (Greimas & Courtés, 1982). The author's perception of the city is treated through Sündüz Öztürk Kasar's (2012) concept of "watermark translation", defining the representations of Istanbul as a translation executed in the author's mind (p. 267). To highlight the traces of the translator as covert co-author and evaluate the consequences of this interference, the meaning transformations in the target text are analyzed using the "Systematics of Designification in Translation" by Öztürk Kasar (2020a, p. 160). In connection with this, the importance of placing semiotics in the instruction of literary translation is stressed, with an emphasis on the function of the comparative analysis of the source and target texts, which may provide translation and interpretation students with an awareness that can enable them to avoid unintended meaning transformations, as well as stand behind their translation decisions of all kinds, including intended meaning transformations.

Understanding how disability is socially constructed is important for establishing inclusive schools, since the ways in which educators and non-disabled nondisabled students understand disability affect their actions towards disabled students. As social interaction today is very often an interplay between online and offline communication activities, this study aimed to explore how young adolescents in Cyprus construct the concept of disability in a blended environment of interactions. A qualitative research approach was adopted involving focus groups with 18 adolescents, online and face to face semi-structured semistructured individual interviews, participant observation on a Facebook group set up for the purposes of the study, and the first author's reflective diary. A combination of thematic analysis, critical discourse analysis and analytic elements from the field of visual semiotics were used for data analysis. Data analysis indicated that adolescents understand disability mostly through medical and charity models. Based on the data, these understandings arise from the construction of disabled people's multimodal 'invisibility/absence', in both online and offline contexts of adolescents' everyday reality. Suggestions for further research in disability constructions in blended environments, and implications for the field of inclusive education concerning teachers and pre-service teachers' educational practice are discussed.

Classroom communication is increasingly accepted as multimodal, through the orchestrated use of different semiotic modes, resources, and systems. There is growing interest in examining the meaning-making potential of other modes (e.g., gestural, visual, kinesthetic) beyond the semiotic mode of language, in classroom communication and in student reasoning in science. In this paper, we explore the use of a multi-layered analytical framework in an investigation of student reasoning during an open inquiry into the physical phenomenon of dissolving in a primary classroom. The 24 students, who worked in pairs, were video recorded in a facility purposefully designed to capture their verbal and non-verbal interactions during the science session. By employing a multi-layered analytical framework, we were able to identify the interplays between the different semiotic modes and the level of reasoning undertaken by the students as they worked through the tasks. This analytical process uncovered a variety of ways in which the students negotiated ideas and coordinated semiotic resources in their exploration of dissolving. This paper highlights the affordances and challenges of this multi-layered analytical framework for identifying the dynamic inter-relationships between different modes that the students drew on to grapple with the complexity of the physical phenomenon of dissolving.

An oxymoron is a self-contradicting or incongruous word or group of words as in Lord Byron's (1788-1824) line from his satirical epic poem Don Juan; "melancholy merriment", An oxymoron is a rhetorical and epigrammatic device for effect, often revealing paradox. The effect I aim for here is the actualization of affect; affect made relevant and useful for education as a public good. Oxymoron"ing" as an immediate edging of knowledge into experience, hence a way to access a proto subjective level of the affective power of X. The prefix proto indicating the first, original or earliest. I ask how we can become materially identifiable subjects for one another and what would it take to move from a mechanistic approach to education to a more machinic one. It is a view of change that does not steal my powers or affective force away. Furthermore, are the abstractions one attempts to move from imitation to imagination abstract enough? I aim for expansions in our educational rationales for social and natural sustainability. It implies an educational philosophy of multiplicity ready to support and join a creative pluralism of organization and pedagogies and simultaneously counteract predetermined and controlling pluralism of organization and pedagogies. The overarching contribution of this poem is political, pragmatic and ethical and concerns the constitution of subjectivity for education in inter- and intra-generational perspectives through taking part in polysemantic ambiguity, envisioning a modest view to the child as a knowledgeable and connectable collective. Ultimately, a view of the child is our primary measurement indicator for educational quality. The competence most important to develop for educators is impression tenderness in order to meet the expressions of the child.

Cognitive difficulty arises from two types of cognitive processes: treatments; within the same, conversions; between different types of representational registers. Conversions are difficult since they ask for understanding of two representations. Direction and the choice of first register could be a threshold for the student. Wasan geometry is used as a thought provoker and pre service mathematics teachers' written solutions to those problems for usage of cognitive processes: treatments and conversions are analyzed by content analysis method of qualitative research. Descriptive data regarding number of conversions and treatments are given. As much as correct/partially correct answers, the relation between cognitive processes and answers were analyzed. Students' written answers to three Wasan geometry problems on tangent circles are qualitatively analyzed for specific examples of treatment processes and conversion processes. Neither problem type nor correct answer is a reason for the choice of representational registers. One treatment may be worth many conversions. More usage is related to students' conformity. Direction of the conversion may be misleading. None of the students stays in mono-functional registers. Top and lowest grade students use more treatments and conversions. Usage of more conversions is not related to success and result in less number of treatments.

The use of digital teaching materials is increasing in mathematics teaching. The dynamic resources of these materials have great potential, for example to adapt the content to different teaching methods and different students. These materials also provide new opportunities for the increasing distance learning. However, in order to take advantage of this potential and to avoid possible disadvantages, a deepened understanding of the function of these materials is needed. In this article, we describe a social semiotic model for multimodal analysis of digital teaching materials in mathematics. The suggested model is intended as a tool for researchers as well as for teachers, to analyse how affordances by digital technology are utilized to offer mathematical meaning in different teaching materials, by an analysis of networks of information offered regarding central aspects of mathematical concepts.

This study seeks to reveal the perceptions of pre-service visual arts teachers on social justice through art-based practices focused on social justice. Designing on visual phenomenology, this study was performed in the fall semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. Five different activities involving visual inquiries are presented to reveal the perceptions of the pre-service teachers on social justice. The research participants are 35 (13 male, 22 female) sophomore-level pre-service teachers. The data are obtained through course documents, reflective diaries and semi-structured interviews. The data are then analysed through content analysis; reliability and validity are ensured through triangulation. This study identifies four different themes: association, questioning, transformation and reflection. The findings show that the pre-service teachers questioned common issues related to social justice. It was observed in the activities performed in this study that the pre-service teachers identified the visual themes. They mentioned common social justice issues based on the things they experienced and their observations. These are such as women's rights, violence against women, children's rights, LGBT, animal rights, language and religion differences, income imbalance, racism, and discrimination. The issues they questioned were the direct expression of the individual experiences of the pre-service teachers through visuals.

This study's focus was two-fold, first to look at forms of gestures teachers of multilingual mathematics classes use during teaching; and second to find out how teachers of multilingual mathematics classes utilize learners' home language, language of learning and teaching and gestures to foster understanding in the teaching of mathematics. This qualitative case study is informed by the embodied cognition theory and social constructivism. Two purposively selected Grade 11 teachers were observed and video recorded while teaching trigonometry for a week in a multilingual policy environment. They were each interviewed for an hour. Results shows that iconic and deictic gestures were frequently used to link the teacher's verbal language and the diagrams on the chalkboard or what was previously learnt, to ground cognition into the physical teaching and learning environment. Metaphoric gestures were less used while beat gestures were not used. Results also show that there exists an intricate semiotic and symbiotic relationship between gestures (bodily actions), and spoken language (in two or more languages in the same environment). In this paper, I conclude that in multilingual classes all forms of teacher gestures that indicate and refers to objects and locations in reality may help improve learning. Gestures and verbal languages complement each other, and should be used as resources for mediating and scaffolding teaching and learning.

This paper adopts a semiotic perspective on mathematical learning according to Peirce, in which the actions on material arrangements are considered the bases for diagrammatic work. The focus is on the learner's actions using digital and analogue material arrangements which are the starting point for the reconstruction of the learner's mathematical interpretations. In this paper a qualitative interpretative paradigm is adopted for the reconstruction. Specifically, a semiotic specification of the context analysis according to Mayring and an adoption of Vogel, is carried out. The reconstruction of the mathematical interpretation is presented with a focus on a geometrical problem that third graders are working on. Finally, the results of several cases are compared to identify possible differences between the analysed actions when using digital and analogue material arrangements.

The study identifies the archetypal motives of the Hero and the Seeker in modern rap lyrics, demonstrating a certain archetypal basis of the rap artists' identity. The problem of the archetype-identity correlation has been solved through the use of the method prioritizing the discursive role invariant as the index of the artists' both psychic dispositions and cultural-semiotic background, thus performing identity eliciting function. The aim of the article is to identify the rappers' archetypal roles of Hero and Seeker based on the linguistic and narrative devices. Four motive-descriptors underlying the Hero archetype are manifested by role invariants of Champion winner, Warrior-soldier, prophet / savior and noble rescuer. Each of them is based either on the metaphorical interpretation of rap performance as the sporting contest, a battle at war, the Universe and blessing, or on allusions to precedential characters significant for the rap artists' self-identification. Narrative manifestations of the Hero formation involve five correlations with stages of the Hero's Journey associated with Joseph Campbell's Monomyth: Ordinary World of childhood and adolescence; obstacles and enemies; Inmost Cave as an inner conflict and fears the Hero has to face; metaphorical "death" foregrounded by symbols of "beyond world" or transition space between the worlds; a transfiguration into a new status in a new world of luxury and success, "awarded" by material symbols of prosperity.

In this work we will analyze the relation between registers of representation and the construction of the fraction concept. Ninety-six students from first year of compulsory secondary education participated in the study, and performed equal share tasks in the context of Egyptian fractions (unit fractions with different denominators). The aim was to determine if, with these types of tasks, students could improve their learning of the different meanings of the fraction concept. Our results indicate that there seems to be a relationship between the meaning used and the representation chosen. Similarly, we found that--with these tasks--students significantly increased the number of registers of representation they used. Students who used distinct representations had to coordinate several registers, which might be interpreted as proof of the development of conceptual understanding.

This article has two main objectives. 1. To open a new concept to scientific views by presenting it to the field. 2. To show how the digi-slave creation process can work with the Use of Psycho-Semiotic Language; causing someone to develop a particular attitude in the desired direction and changing the existing one, in other words, changing the existing point of view, giving a new perspective, hence a new thought formation management and concluding it in the desired direction should be added to these. Although not by this name, it is one of the methods used in public relations. What are the tools for Psycho-Semiotic Language Use? What is the Psycho-Semiotic Language Usage Parser? Which disciplines does it take advantage of? In conclusion in this article which focuses on these issues, it is possible to manipulate the target and captures its mind through the Psycho-Semiotic Language use. This article introduces the Psycho-Semiotic Language Use, which is a new concept and definition based on Ronald Barthes's 'narrative strategy', and deals with the misuse of this language. Mind manipulation can also be achieved through narrative strategies formed through psychological analysis. In the psychological analysis, the effect of digital environments and the issue of raising awareness and taking measures in response to the process leading to become digi-slave are dwelled on. Wishing you to take this into consideration, the subject of the article has been written as a subject that is still being studied and developed.

The "language pyramid" in the post-colonial territories as propounded by Melchers and Shaw in 2003 aptly reflects on the status of different languages in Pakistan. At the top is English, with its heritage as a colonial language. Then is the "national" language Urdu which has nationalist value and is spoken by the majority as a lingua franca; while at the bottom of this hierarchy are the regional languages and their dialects. This hierarchy of languages has deeper repercussions enrooting stratification based on social class and commodification of languages. In this paper, this claim is substantiated by semiotic analysis of a social media text- an amateur video clip that went viral on Facebook in January 2021 in which owners of a high-end cafe in Islamabad mock their manager's English. The video is only the tip of the iceberg of the symbolic and linguistic capitals of English in Pakistan. This analysis is further pleaded by the literature on the critical approach to language policy and planning (LPP). This critical approach can be traced back to the 1980s and Tollefson's oft-cited book in 1991 that endeavors to situate LPP as a part of ongoing conflicts between the elites and the common masses. He regards that the evolution of the critical approach has widened its scope rendering it primarily sociocultural, dealing with the dynamics of status and prestige. Thus stated, this research attempts to converge the critical relational theory of Bourdieu with semiotics to address this issue of class discrimination based on the hegemony of English in Pakistan through a multimethodological approach.

This study centers around Vietnamese students, with a comparison with East and Southeast Asian students who share the same cultural idea, at higher education level who want to acquire better writing skills in English in and out of academic settings. Since English is not the students' first language, they normally craft an essay from the vocabulary that they know. This is understandable, but a good piece of writing in standard American English is not supposed to be traced word by word. Understanding this fact in-depth and practicing it regularly is the core requirement for English major students. In return, they can join any workplace with their strong writing skills that they have to acquire during their undergraduate years, or more if they attend graduate schools. This group of students is known to be timid since they were raised in a collectivistic community in which many of them make their higher education choices based on firstly the current trend, then what is suitable for them. Thus, by making a bolder choice of declaring English as a major, double major, or minor, they could have better insight into English rhetoric and composition to apply them as a multi-meaning sign to their writings properly.

This study explores the ways in which master thesis writers position their research in the field of English language teaching in a context where academic literacies are still a developing field. From a social semiotic perspective, this paper aims to identify the resources writers use to represent their object of study and provide a context and justification for research. The analysis focuses on the ideational and textual metafunctions to account for patterns of meanings in seven introductory chapters of master theses in English teacher education. The results reveal a set of interconnected genres--descriptions of the object of study, definitions, and personal exemplum--that build a shared experience with the reader as well as the persuasive purpose of the text.

Co-authored by Scottish secondary school teacher Kerry Abercrombie and film education practitioner Jamie Chambers, this article explores School of Media, a specialist pathway within a Scottish secondary school in which young people are able to engage with film education potentially throughout their entire experience of high school. First exploring how School of Media seeks to reconcile aspects of film education with Scotland's national 'Curriculum for Excellence', this essay subsequently adopts a chronological perspective, detailing specific aspects of School of Media's approach within each of the six years of secondary school. The essay concludes by emphasising the importance of enabling and empowering teacher-led approaches to film education within Scottish classrooms.

The current paper aims to identify the mathematical connections activated by 10 Mexican high school students while solving mathematical tasks that involve the exponential and logarithmic function. We used the Expanded Mathematical Connections Model (EMCM) and the OntoSemiotic Approach of Cognition and Mathematical Instruction (OSA) as theoretical frameworks. Task-based interviews were used to collect data that was analyzed using thematic and ontosemiotic analyses. It was found that the connection of reversibility is essential for achieving students' full understanding of the existent relationship between the exponential and logarithmic function; however, this requires a network of connections.

This study aims to investigate the influence of story creation on young EFL learners' reading performance. Action research was adopted to examine the effects of two different story reading projects in a library setting in Taiwan. Each project comprised a group of 19 young EFL learner from Grades 4 to 6 (aged 10-12). The first group's activities consisted of picture storybook reading and word games. The results obtained from the pre- and post-reading tests on the learners' performance revealed an increase in their English reading scores. But the results of the learners' motivation and anxiety questionnaire were unsatisfactory. To overcome this discrepancy, a 3D virtual construction task using Omni-immersion Vision, an online VR construction tool, was added to the reading activity. This let the students express their ideas through multimodal resources including text and images in their stories and their 3D virtual contexts. The results showed that the second group made improvements not only in their English language reading but also in their learning motivation, and they demonstrated lower levels of anxiety than the first group. It appears that a combination of multimodal stories and context construction in virtual worlds benefited EFL learners.

Based on a study of the digital literacy practices of immigrant Filipino students in Vancouver, this paper focuses on how learners with unequal access to resources engage with different tools to locate information and find opportunities for language learning online. Data was collected through interviews and observations of participants as they used YouTube, Google Search, and Google Translate to decode unfamiliar words and find resources for learning. Framed through a materialist semiotic lens, this study examined how the students negotiated their resources on these platforms to achieve different intentions. Findings show that the way learners navigate these spaces can vary based on the devices they use (laptop vs. mobile phone), the user interface (browser vs. app), and the orientation they choose (landscape vs. portrait). The material dimensions of the screen determine the arrangement of semiotic forms, and varying configurations of devices, interfaces, and orientations shape the information made available to the learner and the digital literacy practices of scrolling, clicking, and shifting tabs. Recognizing how the online environment of a platform can shift across these layers of mediation, this paper conceptualizes the linguistic and semiotic forms that constitute design as sociotechnical structures which provide various learning affordances and constraints.