Activity Theory, Mediated Action and Literacy: Assessing how children make meaning in multiple modes

The paper reports a study into children's literacy in Bangladesh. It presents reading and writing profiles of a stratified random sample of ten year-old children. The paper argues that while these profiles might be a valuable source of information for the Government of Bangladesh as well as for the international donor community, especially in that they provide diagnostic information of children's literacy development, they do not portray fully the potential of children as meaning-makers. A small number of children from those who performed poorly in assessments of reading and writing were subjected to a further study in which they participated in a 'designing and making' activity. Here, the multiple modes through which children communicated meaning and understanding became the focus of the assessment. This means that we did not look solely at the linguistic mode but focused also on 'mediated action' as a mode through which meaning is made. Thus the potential of children to represent meaning and to create and shape 'new' texts through collaborative engagement with each other, as well as with the material and linguistic resources being used in the activity, became the prime focus of assessment. The paper shows that children who performed poorly on tests of reading and writing were potentially creative meaning-makers when other modes of representation like action and speech were considered. The paper concludes that large-scale studies of children's literacy are necessary and will continue to provide important sources of information for governments attempting to alleviate poverty and create equitable access to education and other social services. On the other hand, data obtained in this fashion mask the potential of children as creative meaning-makers. The study reported here shows that teacher-based assessment, expanded to recognise modes of meaning-making other than language, can be a vital, additional source of information for those interested in children as learners.