A Transmedia Turn in Educational Strategies: Storytelling in Teaching Literature to School Students

Abstract

The article presents theoretical and methodological approaches to using modern media technology in teaching humanities at school. Mediatization of a broad range of cultural practices has altered the mechanisms of cultural memory formation, so school students’ online communication skills should become the foundation of literary education to achieve a balance between tradition and modernization.
Transmedia educational strategies proposed in the article allow implementing the principles of humanistic education in teaching humanities subjects. Narration, in its turn — as a method associated with the Russian tradition of teaching literary arts — allows applying the findings of modern semiotic, narratological, and media studies to promote the development of pedagogical practices. In narrative-based learning, the literary text becomes the core of a transmedia project, in which the teacher and students act as directors using various media formats to construct their own narratives on the basis of the writer’s script. Transmedia adaptation of literary classics helps students reconceptualize characters’ ambitions and values, develop creative and critical thinking skills, and get a better understanding of historical and everyday contexts. Cross-platform engagement invokes multiple layers of meaning and artistry, immersing all project participants — students as well as teachers — into a common space of communication, aesthetic experience, and mutual learning, if necessary. 
Examples illustrating the strategy proposed include educational projects developed with our immediate participation, from our own literature textbook to multimedia projects, in particular the one based on Ivan Goncharov’s Oblomov for the Live Pages project and the one based on Leo Tolstoy’s works as part of the Digital Tolstoy initiative.