Maggie Garrard, the Curriculum Manager at the Australian Children's Television Foundation (ACTF), gave a presentation about the ACTF and its educational resources and programs. The ACTF is a national non-profit organization funded by the government to provide entertaining and educational media for Australian children. It has screened programs in over 100 countries and won over 100 awards. The ACTF focuses on using media to encourage learning in areas like critical thinking, language development, and values. It aligns its resources to the Australian curriculum and considers theories of learning.

1. Maggie Garrard
Curriculum Manager
Multiliteracies
and
ACTFACTF programs and education resourcesprograms and education resources
Presentation to the Australian Catholic University Students
12 August 2013
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

2. About the ACTF
A national non-profit organisation, funded by
the government, committed to providing
Australian children, 2-18 with entertaining
media made especially for them, which makes
an enduring contribution to their cultural and
educational experience.
ACTF programs have screened in over 100
countries and have won over 100 local and
international awards.
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

3. ACTF CHARTER
Entertainment/Education
The most powerful learning
occurs when our brains, senses
and hearts are engaged.
 Quality media can motivate,
create wonder and inspire children
to learn.
 Media, used by children, needs
to be monitored and negotiated to
be a positive part of their lives.
First Day
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

5. PresentationPresentation
• using screen media to encourage thinking, reading and language
development
• how teachers (English and The Arts) can encourage critical judgement
and understanding through viewing, listening, creating, writing
(interacting)
• the stages of media literacy and how to develop analytical, critical and
creative skills in children
• using screen media to develop values
• how young children respond to TV, film, advertising and multimedia
.
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

6. Curriculum & cross-curriculumCurriculum & cross-curriculum
alignmentalignment
Resources are aligned with the Australian Curriculum for
•English, History, Science,
•Arts, Geography, LOTE
•Health & PE, Technology/ICTs, Civics & Citizenship
Cross curriculum priorities:
•Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
•Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia
•Sustainability.
General capabilities:
•literacy
•numeracy
•information and communication technology (ICT) competence
•critical and creative thinking
•ethical behaviour
•personal and social competence
•intercultural understanding.
Phases of learning:
Years: F-2, 3-6, 7-10, 11-12
All ACTF resources support effective and current pedagogical theory/ research reflective of contemporary educational
research.
For example: Inquiry approaches including the E5 framework, Bloom’s Taxonomy, De Bono’s Six Hats, among others.
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

7. We live in a digital multi-media age for which new skills and
strategies are required. There is now a dynamic integrative
relationship between new literacies and traditional literacies
which changes the whole continuum. We have to grasp that
because of the use of new literacies generates innovation,
literacies from now on will be constantly changing.
Professor Len Unsworth, UNE, “Negotiating New Literacies in Literacy Learning and Teaching, 2008
These are the challenges:
• Children are fascinated by new literacies
• Children have increased access to them
• Children will always know more than teachers about them
• There is a disjunction between home and school use
So….
We need to reconceptualise literacy in schools to account for multi-modality
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

8. Media/Screen literacy
Media/screen literacy aims to assist students to deal critically with the media
and their role in their lives.
The media/screen literate student should be able to make conscious, critical
assessments of media, to maintain a critical distance on popular culture,
and to resist manipulation.
More specifically, it is education that aims to increase students’
understanding and enjoyment of how the media work, how they produce
meaning, how they are organised, and how they are construct reality.
Media literacy also aims to provide students with the ability to create
media products.
Duncan, 1998, pg 7
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

9. Differences between reading of print-based and multimodal texts.
Reading print based texts Reading multimodal texts
Words: The words ‘tell’ including the
discourse, register, vocabulary, linguistic
patterns, grammar, chapters, paragraph
and sentence structure.
Visual images: The images ‘show’
including layout, size, shape, colour, line,
angle, position, perspective., screen,
frames, icons, links, hyperlinks…
Use of senses: visual some tactile. Use of senses: visual, tactile, hearing,
kinaesthetic
Interpersonal meaning: developed
through verbal ‘voice’ - through use of
dialogue, 1st, 2nd, 3rd person narrator
Interpersonal meaning: developed
through visual ‘voice’: positioning,
angle, perspective – ‘offers’ and
‘demands’.
Verbal style: including tone, intonation,
humour, irony, sarcasm, word play,
developed in the use of ‘words’.
Typographical arrangement, formatting,
layout, font, punctuation
Visual style: choice of medium,
graphics, animation, frames, menu board,
hypertext links.
Verbal imagery: including description,
images, symbolism, metaphor, simile,
alliteration [poetic devices with words,
sound patterns].
Visual imagery: use of colour, motifs,
icons, repetition.
Reading pathway: mostly linear and
sequential. Reader mostly follows.
Reading pathway: use of vectors – nonsequential,
non-linear. Reader has more choice and
opportunity to interact.
Maureen Walsh, Reading visual and multimodal texts: how is ‘reading’ different? (2004),

10. www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV
To truly understand visual/media/screen literacy children need to be actively
involved in creating static and moving images (and objects) and feel confident to
respond to their own and other’s works.
How ?
In – active engagement with the construction and production of still and
moving images (and objects)
Through – using the materials, techniques, codes and conventions
specific to the construction and production of still and moving images
(and objects)
About – researching past and present artists/ writers/ producers, their
forms, styles, ideas, meanings, techniques etc used to construct and
produce still and moving images (and objects)

11. www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV
THINKING
Our world and the world of the future demand that all students are supported to become effective and skillful thinkers.
Thinking validates existing knowledge and enables individuals to create new knowledge and to build ideas and make
connections between them.
It entails reasoning and inquiry together with processing and evaluating information. It enables the exploration of
perceptions and possibilities.
It also involves the capacity to plan, monitor and evaluate one’s own thinking, and refine and transform ideas and
beliefs.
The Thinking Processes domain encompasses a range of cognitive, affective and metacognitive knowledge, skills
and behaviours which are essential for students to function effectively in society, both within and beyond school.
An explicit focus on thinking and the teaching of thinking skills aims to develop students’ thinking to a qualitatively higher level.
Students need to be supported to move beyond the lower-order cognitive skills of recall and comprehension to the
development of higher-order processes required for creative problem solving, decision making and
conceptualising.
In addition, they need to develop the capacity for metacognition – the capacity to reflect on and manage their own thinking.
This can only happen if the school and classroom culture values and promotes thinking and if students are provided with
sufficient time to think, reflect, and engage in sustained discussion, deliberation and inquiry.
• http://vels.vcaa.vic.edu.au/essential/interdisciplinary/thinking/index.html
Colleen Abbott &
Susan Wilks
© The Australian Children’s Television Foundation
I Think… is an educational resource comprising a Teachers' Guide, Video
Anthology and Website. It is designed to be used with children aged 5 to 13 as
an aid in teaching them how to participate in philosophical inquiry in the
classroom.
Ten units are contained in the book; more information and four additional units
are available herehere

12. www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV
Creative thought can be divided into divergent and convergent reasoning:
• Divergent thinking is the intellectual ability to think of many original, diverse, and elaborate ideas.
• Convergent thinking: the intellectual ability to logically evaluate, critique and choose the best idea
from a selection of ideas.
Both abilities are required for creative output. Divergent thinking is essential to the novelty of creative
products whereas convergent thinking is fundamental to the appropriateness.
Thus, any general definition of creativity must account for the process of recognition or discovery of novel
ideas and solutions.
CREATIVIT
Y“CREATIVITY IS NOT A SEPARATE ACTIVITY FROM THE INTELLECT,
BUT WHY DO SO MANY ADULTS BELIEVE THEY ARE NOT CREATIVE?”
SIR KEN ROBINSON BELIEVES OUR EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM PLAYS A
ROLE IN DIMINISHING CREATIVITY BY PROMOTING LEARNING BASED
SOLELY ON A CRITICAL AND RATIONAL APPROACH.
“THERE IS A SENSE OF FUTILITY BUILT INTO OUR APPROACH TO THE
ARTS, WHICH IS WHY THEY ARE MARGINALIZED,” HE SAID.
http://tedblog.typepad.com/tedblog/2006/06/sir_ken_robinso.html#

13. http://www.thhttp://aso.gov.au/education/

14. Australian Screen Online/
Eduaction
http://aso.gov.au/education/
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

16. Decade Timeline: highlights events in each decade of Australian history and politics,
society and culture, science & technology that underpin the stories of the children in
each episode (2008-prior to1788).
•Teaching activities (more than 500) and 78 clips for years 3-6 and beyond. The
activities have rich curriculum content that relate directly to the supporting the Australian
curriculum areas of English and History.
•3 main themes and 22 sub-themes where teachers can group relevant teaching
activities and resources to support their individual programs.
•Behind the scenes information including interviews with Nadia Wheatley, Penny
Chapman & Donna Rawlins, stills gallery and clips bank, production materials and poster
design.
•Additional resources and links to relevant content located at other cultural agencies
plus hyperlinks to relevant TLF digital curriculum resources and objects
•Our Place which is an interactive teacher forum where teachers can share their ideas
and strategies for using My Place in the classroom and upload stories from their own
students.
My Place Teachers’ Guide (DVD Rom)
Series 1& 2 + Geography
• A Decade Timeline (2000’s – prior to 1780’s),
• Episodes with information about the series and
downloadable post-production scripts,
• Teaching activities (more than 500) and 78
clips, for years 3-6 and beyond. Interactive
student activity sheets organised into 4 strands,
History, English, Geography and Arts (Media
literacy), All directly support the Australian
curriculum areas of History, English and
Geography.
• There are more than 500 hyperlinks to relevant
content Australian cultural and education agency
websites.
• The Making of My Place information including
interviews with author Nadia Wheatley and TV
series producer Penny Chapman, production
materials, cast and crew lists, press kit and the
My Place websites.
• Photo gallery with hundreds of production stills
from the episodes and behind the scenes.
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

17. Themes evident in the book & TV production
Community & Family
•Identity
•Multiculturalism (Immigration)
•Class & social order
•Indigenous perspectives (and Reconciliation)
•Customs, traditions and beliefs
•Australians at War
•Politics
•Historical events
Technology
•Transport
•Currency
•Technology & homewares
•Electronic and visual media
Lifestyle & Trends
•Food and Celebrations
•Games and pastimes
•Environment and urbanisation
•Business and Employment
•Education
•Literature and music
•Pets
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

18. Technology is only a tool…
• ‘Computers are providing us with a whole new way of thinking about
teaching and learning. They’re changing society and schooling
much as the printing press did 600 years ago….. It’s not just a
matter of adding another trick in the teachers’ tool bag but
recognising that computers can be a transformative tool which
enables us and our students to think and act in a whole new way
about teaching and learning.’
David Nettlebeck, Computers for thinking: from theory to practice, Teacher, June 2007
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

19. THANK YOU FOR YOURTHANK YOU FOR YOUR
INTEREST & SUPPORTINTEREST & SUPPORT
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV

20. Maggie Garrard
Curriculum Manager
Australian Children's Television Foundation
Level 3, 145 Smith Street
Fitzroy, VICTORIA 3065
Ph: +61 3 9200 5500
Email: maggie.garrard@actf.com.au
Website: www.actf.com.au
www.actf.com.au/education/ @OzKidsTV