Easter Celebrations at Home

“Easter celebrations at home: Acquiring symbolic knowledge and constructing identities” Ana Souza, Olga Barradas & Malgosia Woodham Introduction The first decade of the 21st century witnessed British policy-makers turning attention to the home experiences of children of immigrant backgrounds as well as recognising the relevance of knowledge acquired at home in the children’s learning and in the construction of their identities. The Department for Education and Skills (DfES), then responsible for the education system and children’s services in England, set out the entitlement of pupils as young as 7 years old to learn languages and emphasised the importance of learning after school (National Languages Strategy, 2002). Primary Schools were also encouraged to develop closer links with their local communities as a way of better supporting their pupils (Aiming High, 2003). Later, in 2006, the Excellence and Enjoyment report guided teachers on strategies to support the learning of bilingual learners, including the use of their first languages as resources whilst the Curriculum Review report (2007) recommended that issues of identity, including religion, be dealt with explicitly in order to fulfil the necessary pedagogical strategies for fostering citizenship. In addition, in 2009, the cultural and religious dimensions of a child’s background were considered relevant in promoting emotional and mental wellbeing (Your child, Your schools, Our future, Department for Children, Schools and Families, DCSF). More recently, a publication by the Department for Education (DfE, 2011) recognised as good practice schools’ offer of individual tuition to learners of English as an Additional Language at flexible times both in school time and at weekends to ensure it did not clash with pupils’ community/faith commitments. Despite this positive take of British policies on the culture, language, religion and identity of migrants and their children, little has been done in relation to exploring children’s experience in migrant faith settings. Therefore, this article examines the impact of religious practices on the acquisition of subject knowledge and the construction of identity of children. We start by presenting the sociocultural concepts which are the basis of the theoretical framework adopted. We then describe the research project from which the examples in this chapter are taken and present the contexts in which the data were collected. We illustrate our discussions with examples from a 9-year-old Polish boy and show how the boy’s symbolic knowledge is developed and his skills are acquired at home through his participation in faith activities around Easter. We argue that learning at home can enrich the experiences of children of migrant backgrounds and contribute to the development of their symbolic knowledge – which could be successfully transferable to mainstream schools learning. Theoretical Framework Sociocultural theory, the basis of the theoretical framework adopted in this chapter, assumes that mental activity is mediated by social interactions as well as by culturally derived symbolic tools (Wertsch 1985 in Fernyhough 2008, 227) such as language (Lantolf 2000) and physical artefacts (Wertsch 1998). Although the possibility of understanding mediation by separating its human aspect from the symbolic one has been questioned (Kozulin 2002), for the purpose of organizing the structure of this text, we initially present these two aspects separately in this section. Note, however, that these two aspects – human and symbolic – will be brought together later in this chapter. Learning from others Vygotsky (1981) advocates that learning takes place at two levels. At the first level, the social one (interpsychological), children learn through interacting with others in specific social contexts. At the second level, the psychological one (intrapsychological), children learn through their mental processes. To Vygotsky (1978, 57), ‘[a]ll the higher functions originate as actual relations between human individuals’. For children of primary school age, these relations include the family and those in their everyday life. Hence, the importance of highlighting prolepsis and funds of knowledge as two relevant sociocultural concepts to examine the impact of religious practices at home. Prolepsis was presented by Cole (1996) as the transmission to children of knowledge selected by their parents. It is through prolepsis that knowledge acquired in the past (memories) is brought into the present (interactions) with the expectation (imagination) that it will have a relevant role in one’s future. Funds of knowledge, on the other hand, is a concept developed by Moll et al (1992) with the purpose of improving the learning experiences of Mexican-American children attending schools in Arizona. Their main idea was that by capitalizing on the essential resources, i.e. knowledge and skills, held by the children’s communities for their proper functioning, teachers would see the child as a whole person. Consequently, the knowledge brought to school by the students could be pedagogically validated and drawn on as a way of enhancing their learning in schools (González 2005). The importance of the sociocultural goals of human mediation in specific communities has also been acknowledged by the concept of guided participation, one of the three aspects of mediation advocated by Rogoff (Kozulin 2002). Guided participation relates to the joint activity in which learner and mediator engage. The other two aspects of mediation advocated by Rogoff (1995) are apprenticeship and appropriation. The former is when the mediator provides a model to the learner, whereas the latter is when the learner changes as a result of having engaged with the mediator. The role of interaction and participation in learning was also highlighted by Lave and Wenger (1991) who emphasised it as an ‘integral and inseparable aspect of social practice’ (p. 53). In a later publication, Wenger (2010) stresses the role of sociocultural interaction as being the location for learning and the community of practice as part of that learning. Community of practice is defined as ‘a group of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do, and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly’1. They share a) the domain (members are brought together by a learning need they share); b) the community (their collective learning becomes a bond among them over time) and c) the practice (their interactions produce resources that affect their practice). Learning from symbolic tools The role of symbolisation or semiotics in learning is a central tenet of Vygotsky’s framework (1978), since development is conceptualized ‘as the transformation of socially shared activities into internalized processes’ (John-Steiner and Mahn 1996, 192). Through internalised socially mediated activity, children develop internally oriented signs (symbols) and externally oriented tools, the use of which “limitlessly broadens the range of activities within which the new psychological functions may operate. In this context, we can use the term higher psychological function, or higher behavior as referring to the combination of tool and sign in psychological activity” (Vygotsky 1978, 55). For Vygotsky (1978), it is through mediating interpersonal processes, recreating psychological activity on the basis of sign operations, of which language is the most important, that cultural forms of behaviour are internalised. Higher cognitive functions are, consequently, the result of and inextricably linked to society and culture: ‘If one changes the tools of thinking available to a child, his mind will have a radically different structure’ (Berg 1970, 164 in Cole et al 1978, 126). Implied in this reasoning is the argument that, if a child has access to richer symbolic interactions, mediated by social interaction with others, more complex thinking skills will develop. Language, a symbolic tool par excellence, will both contribute to and develop from such interactions and social experiences. An example of the complex relationship between cognitive development and language can be seen in the analysis of metaphorical discourse2. Metaphors have been analysed as a form of thought, representing conceptual mappings, related to culture and originating in human experience. This analysis has led to different theories (e.g. Lakoff and Johnson 1980). However, objects, representing events and experiences, imbued with symbolism, can also constitute metaphorical representations. As such, their use in rituals and ceremonies would constitute an abstraction of meaning, social interaction and experience. http://wenger-trayner.com/resources/what-is-a-community-of-practice See the Metaphor Analysis Project on http://creet.open.ac.uk/projects/metaphor-analysis/projectintroduction.cfm 1 2 Similarly to learning, identity results from a social process where individual characteristics are shaped according to the experiences one has in interaction with others, as discussed below. Constructing identities The complexity of identity and its effect on language learning has led Norton (2000) to claim three central characteristics for identity: it is multiple, a site of struggle and changeable. The multiplicity of identity is a consequence of the diverse roles that constitute an individual and which are constantly changing across time and space. Furthermore, Norton (2011) highlights that identities are ‘constructed within diverse discourses or sites of practice’ (p. 2). Therefore, we consider identity to be the way individuals see themselves linked, in terms of knowledge and emotions, to certain structures in society, and thus, refers to a variety of components such as religion, gender, age, language and ethnicity (Souza 2008, 38). Religion and language, in particular, are considered significant cultural resources in the process of migration (Omoniyi 2012). In fact, these two aspects of identity (religion and language) have been combined with a third one (ethnicity) in the development of a three-dimensional framework (the REL-triangle) for the examination of language planning and policy in ethnic churches in the UK (Souza et al 2012). The application of this framework to the study on which this chapter draws showed that the decisions made by the faith leaders about the language planning in their congregations were affected by their theological orientations as well as by the linguistic and cultural identities of their followers. In this chapter, we focus on how the acquisition of symbolic knowledge and the construction of identities of a child are affected by the religious activities practised at home by him and his family. The Study The data presented in this chapter is part of a larger ethnographic study entitled Becoming Literate in Faith Settings (BeLiFS), which was funded by the British Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) between 2009 and 2013. The study took place in London and included four migrant faith communities: Bangladeshi Muslim, Tamil Hindu, Ghanaian Pentecostal and Polish Catholic. In Year 1 of this study, the field researchers visited places of worship and video recorded the buildings, ceremonies, rituals and events. These recordings were made with the aim of investigating the scope and nature of literacy practices in each faith setting. In Year 2, the children were given Flip cameras (simple video cameras) and asked to record faith activities in which they participated at home. In this phase, we aimed to find out how teaching and learning of faith occurred outside the place of worship. Thus, the BeLiFS project used video recording in both a more traditional way, where the researchers went into the field and collected video data, and a more participatory way, where participants produced their own videos of their everyday practices, in this case, their religious practices. Discussions on the data collected for this study by the researchers are presented elsewhere (Gregory et al 2013). In this chapter, we focus on the recordings made by the participants and discuss them through the use of ‘transvisuals’ (a combination of representation of data through the use of scripts and visuals) (Bezemer & Mavers 2011). In this phase, the children were also asked to make a scrapbook on the faith activities in which they participate. More specifically, this chapter focuses on a 9-year-old Polish boy, Adam, and his participation in one of the main celebrations in the Catholic calendar, Easter. This Christian festival commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the belief that He miraculously returned to life three days after being executed by crucifixion. The celebrations are full of symbols, as explored in one video-recorded event and on the three pages of Adam’s scrapbook which cover Easter. We consider these two sets of data useful in illustrating the social and the psychological levels which are part of the learning process as advocated by Vygotsky (1981) and discussed above. The video-recorded event enables us to witness the social interactions through which Adam is presented to the symbolic knowledge related to Easter celebrations, whereas his scrapbook evidences how he has appropriated this knowledge, as discussed in the two sections that follow the presentation we make of Adam. Adam, a Polish Catholic boy in London Polish is the second most spoken language in London (Census Information Scheme, 2013), due to the Polish community’s history of five centuries of migration to the UK. The largest flows of Polish migrants were after the World War II and after Poland’s accession to the European Union in 2004 (Travena 2009 in Souza et al 2012). These migrants brought their faith with them from Poland, where 95% of the population is Catholic and the Roman Catholic is the biggest branch of the four in existence in that country3. As a consequence, the size of this community is also reflected in the large number (68) of Polish Roman Catholic churches in London4. Adam’s family attends one of these Polish ethnic Roman Catholic churches in South-east London and Adam attends faith lessons in this church every Saturday. These lessons encourage the speaking of Polish and the preservation of religious and cultural values (Souza et al 2012). The links between linguistic, religious and ethnic identities valued in the faith lessons are also valued at home by Adam’s family, as illustrated below by the data video-recorded by Adam’s father and the data in Adam’s scrapbook. 3 4 http://en.poland.gov.pl/Churches,and,Religious,Life,in,Poland,397.html http://www.catholiclinks.org/paroquiasinglaterra.htm The sharing of Easter hard-boiled egg, a video-recorded event On Easter Sunday, Polish families gather for a festive meal, which begins with a symbolic sharing of a hardboiled egg blessed in church the day before. Adam’s family recorded this faith activity which was attended by another Polish couple and their two children. This event lasted one minute and fifty-one seconds and can be seen in full on the link http://www.belifs.co.uk/families/easter_egg_sharing.html. Four of these video stills are analysed here under Bezemer & Mavers’ (2011) social semiotic perspective. We acknowledge that these representational choices add analytical insights at the same time as they lose certain details – as any video data which are turned into multimodal transcripts (ibid, 196). Nevertheless, a focus on how the data are framed, which data were selected and what aspects of the data are highlighted in the transvisuals are useful in structuring the video data analysis. Framing the data The communicational aims of the original interaction in the video were to celebrate Easter with family members and friends. Both families (a couple and two children each) stood around the table to share the Easter hard-boiled egg, symbolic of Jesus’s resurrection, and consequently, His intention to show His love to human kind and bring them peace. Adam’s mother was on the left side of the camera, leading the ceremony. She held her baby girl on her arm. Adam was on her left and her husband, on her right. The other family mirrored this position on the right side of the camera/table. The four video stills mainly show Adam’s mother, his baby-sister and himself. His father is the one making the recording, and thus, is never in the video itself. The purpose of these stills is to show what Adam is learning through this interaction. Selecting the data The video selected reflects the prominence of Easter celebrations within the Catholic calendar, its religious importance to the Polish community in general, as well as to this family in particular. These data were also telling in relation to the amount of symbolic knowledge being negotiated and which could be considered both by the video-recording made by Adam’s father as well as by the information in the scrapbook made by Adam himself. The whole video was watched by the team and the four video stills were considered to stand out in relation to the understanding of the ritual as well as in how the children were being socialized through the use of different modes into the symbolic knowledge involved in the interaction. The frames were selected not based on time intervals, but on specific key moments. We tried to show how speech approximately coincided with movement and gaze, therefore, we superimposed the writing onto the video stills selected. Highlighting data We highlight six modes5 in the transvisuals presented. They are (1) food, (2) clothes, (3) position, (4) language, (5) gaze and (6) movement. The first three modes apply to the four transvisuals under discussion. The first one, a plate of blessed hard-boiled eggs, is what the ceremony revolves around. The importance of this mode to the interaction is highlighted by Adam’s father, who chooses to close up on it. We interpret this as his way of communicating the importance of this food item in the religious ceremony in which his family engages. The second mode, the clothes, seems to symbolize the importance of the celebration to this Polish family. All the participants are well dressed. Both Adam and his cousin are wearing a shirt and tie. His mother, sister, aunt and female cousin are well dressed too. The formality of this occasion is also signalled by the third mode: the position. All the participants are standing around the table. It is only after the eggs have been shared and their wishes exchanged, that the participants are allowed to sit down and have their Easter breakfast. The importance of position (mode 3) is reinforced in the other parts of the video by the guest family being positioned to mirror the way Adam’s family stands around the table, i.e. son, mother, father. This is only broken in relation to the daughters. Adam’s sister, still a baby, is being held by her mother, instead of standing by her father, who is doing the recordings. The Polish language, the fourth mode, is an integral part of this home celebration and is used at all times. Nevertheless, due to space constraints, we only present the translations in English. We also highlight gaze (mode 5) with arrows on the video itself and comment on the times when movement (mode 6) played a role in the interaction. In other words, we adopt a multimodal perspective, and thus, explore all the resources on which the participants draw in specific moments and places to shape communication and meaning (Jewitt 2009). In trying to address the complexity of simultaneously representing different modes, we adapt Baldry & Thibault’s (2006) use of matrices with stills and combine them with overlaid graphic features (arrows and circles) (Norris 2004) and overlaid transcript of spoken language (Norris 2006) (cf. Flewitt et al 2009 for these three publications) to design the transvisual matrices below. 5 Mode is a socially shaped and culturally given resource for meaning making (Jewitt 2008). Transvisual Comments Adam’s mother starts the ceremony and explains that she has got blessed eggs. They are on a plate, which she is holding with her right hand. Gaze: Both Adam and her mother direct their gaze to the plate of eggs to which the mother refers in her speech. Movement: Adam leans forward slightly to better view the plate, as his sister is on his mother’s left arm. Figure 1 – Transvisual 1 Matrix 1.1: Egg Sharing Ceremony Comments Transvisual Adam’s father chooses to close up on the eggs when the mother explains that the ceremony involves the sharing of the blessed eggs. It is also then that the symbolic meaning of the eggs is explained. Figure 2 – Transvisual 2 Matrix 1.2: Egg Sharing Ceremony Transvisual Comments Adam’s mother explains her actions as she performs them. This works as a demonstration of what to do to the other participants. Movement: Adam’s mother passes the plate of eggs to her left hand and uses her right hand to select a piece of the egg. Gaze: Both Adam and his mother direct their gaze to the action being performed by the mother. Figure 3 – Transvisual 3 Matrix 1.3: Egg Sharing Ceremony Transvisual Comments After putting one piece of the egg in her mouth, Adam’s mother involves Adam in the activity. Movement: Adam’s mother moves the plate towards Adam, who gets one piece of the egg. Language: Adam’s mother models what to say when the egg is offered and before it is eaten. Adam repeats the wishes. Gaze: Adam and his mother look at each other when exchanging the good wishes at the same time the Figure 4– Transvisual 4 action of taking the egg is performed. Matrix 1.4: Egg Sharing Ceremony As highlighted by Ivarsson et al (2009), there is an apparent contradiction in applying a multimodal analysis within a sociocultural framework. Sociocultural theory emphasises the centrality of language as a symbolic resource in communication, whereas multimodality brings to the surface the importance of other symbolic tools in social practices. However, ‘learning is embedded in visual and discursive practices, where the two modes build on, and presuppose, each other in a successive shaping of the abilities of the novice to single out what is relevant to attend to’ (Ivarsson & Säljö 2005 in Ivarsson et al 2009: 203). In other words, there is interdependence between the modes, as also illustrated in Adam’s scrapbook in the next section. Celebrating Easter, pages from a scrapbook Besides making home video recordings, the children also kept scrapbooks. Here, we analyse Adam’s scrapbook by adopting the same multimodal perspective used with the transvisuals. Adam has combined written language with photos, pictures and colours to convey meaning. That is, he has drawn on a multiplicity of modes to represent his faith experiences out-of-school. Framing the data The aims of the scrapbook were to document the children’s language and literacy learning through their faith. Therefore, the children were asked to record faith activities practised at home and in church. Adam’s scrapbook has a total of 24 pages and can be seen on http://www.belifs.co.uk/children/adam_scrapbook.html. The scrapbook has drawings made by Adam, images cut from religious books and magazines, pictures taken by his parents and texts written by him. The activities recorded refer to events at home, in church and in holy places visited by the whole family. They include Adam’s First Communion and Christmas celebrations. Selecting the data Pages 15 to 17 of Adam’s scrapbook were selected to be analysed along with the video recordings of the sharing of the hard-boiled egg, as they both relate to the celebrations of Easter. Highlighting data The six modes highlighted in the video analysis are also relevant in the scrapbook. On page 15, Adam explains the importance of Easter to Christians making use of the Polish language (mode 4 in the transvisuals). Translation Figure 5 – Adam’s Scrapbook Page 15 Easter - It is, for us Christians, the symbolises peace and it protects from misfortune and illnesses. biggest important On Maundy Thursday we pray for priests and all clergy. The festival celebrated to commemorate church bells fall silent and ‘kołatki’ (rattle boxes) are used. On Jesus’ Resurrection. Easter Friday there is a special Mass because instead of an Easter and the follows most the Easter Week ordinary mass we reflect on Jesus’ suffering and we celebrate the which starts with Palm Sunday when Cross and we sing ‘Gorzkie Żale’ (Lenten Lamentations). we get palm branches blessed in Easter Saturday is a day of joyful awaiting the Resurrection. We memory of Jesus’ entry to Jerusalem have Easter Egg baskets blessed on that day. and his crucifixion. A palm Polish is consistently used throughout the scrapbook. In the following two pages, however, written text is combined with photographs. At the top of page 16, there is a picture of Adam with his sister at the entrance of their Church. They are both dressed formally (clothes is mode 2). On the bottom of page 16, there is a picture of the two children again well-dressed but at home. In the two pictures, they are holding objects that have special meanings for Easter celebrations. The first one is the palm, which after being blessed, as explained by Adam, signifies Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. The second one is the Easter basket. Both are taken to church to be blessed in a religious service. These pictures are accompanied by short texts of about four lines each which explain their meanings in Polish. Translation Top photo: On Palm Sunday we have palms blessed to signify Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. Bottom photo: We are getting ready to take our Easter baskets to church to have Easter foods blessed. Figure 6 – Adam’s Scrapbook Page 16 The table which was set for the Easter activity recorded on video is photographed and presented at the top of page 17. The formality of the table with a full dinner set and special dishes, including the blessed Easter basket, shows how special the occasion is. As the close-up of the eggs in transvisual 2, a close-up picture of the dinner table emphasises the central role of food (mode 1) in this celebration. This home faith activity is contrasted by an activity in church shown at the bottom of page 17. In this second photograph, Adam is shown kneeling down in front of an altar, which represents Jesus’ grave. Position (mode 3) is highlighted here as symbolizing respect. Translation Top photo: On the Easter table there are traditional dishes and the Easter egg basket and also decorated eggs – ‘pisanki’. Bottom photo: On Easter Sunday at Lord’s grave after Jesus has risen from the grave. Figure 7 – Adam’s Scrapbook Page 17 Given the scrapbook format, gaze (mode 5) and movement (mode 6) cannot be perceived in the same ways as in the video. Nonetheless, the organization of the pages, the texts and the photographs take us in a journey where we are initially presented with a full description of events that take place over four days – we move from one day to another as we read the descriptions on page 15. Pages 16 and 17 direct our gaze to specific Easter symbols which are relevant to Adam and his family in the practising of their faith. In sum, an array of different elements come together to convey meaning. Images and colour, art work and spatial arrangement on the page, facial and body expressions, visual object representations, gestures, words spoken and written become intertwined in a way that all form part of the message being conveyed. Content is constructed and transmitted through multimodal texts of which synaesthesia (the process of shifting between modes and re-representing the same thing from one mode to another) is an integral part (Cope & Kalantzis 2009). As such, Adam’s scrapbook calls attention to the fact that ‘[c]reating a text is never just about writing words on paper. Instead, it is about creating culturally and historically bound meanings by using existing and emerging multimodal resources available to the designer of the text. In other words, creating a text is a literacy practice. As such, it is embedded in a complex and shifting terrain of language ideologies, language norms, and individual experiences and attitudes. This makes literacy practices a vital part of social practices, appropriated or contested by the designer’ (Pietikäinen & Pitkänen-Huhta 2013, 230). Discussion and conclusion In this chapter, we discuss the symbolic knowledge being developed by Adam through his participation in his family’s religious practices in their home in London. We focus particularly on their celebration of Easter with examples of a video-recorded event and of three pages of a scrapbook. According to Jewitt (2008) the mode and media chosen for knowledge representation are crucial and integral aspects of knowledge construction, shaping what is learned and how it is learned. Thus, the video extract and the scrapbook need to be considered together if we are to obtain a truer picture of the learning taking place. One aspect that is evident in both sources (video and scrapbook) is the wealth of symbolism that imbues the texts. From the physical stance, whereby the formal standing upright body positioning mirrors that at church, to the objects and foodstuffs present at the table and in the basket, the symbolic representation is a constant. In fact, by taking part in the egg sharing ceremony, which itself reproduces the ritual of the Eucharist, the participants are replicating what is already a symbolic ritual. Thus, by participating in these religious practices, children develop the ability to deal with highly abstract concepts that can be used in different contexts and situations. In this way, children’s literacy experiences in faith settings may help them to make sense of their learning in mainstream schools (Gregory et al 2012). The narratives contained in the symbolic representations of the religious concepts and in the ritualistic ceremonies will, therefore, contribute to the children’s funds of knowledge that can be transferred to academic contexts. When we consider the ‘interaction’ or ‘mediation’ in a Vygotskian sense, the whole video becomes the interaction/mediation and, therefore, the ‘interpsychological’, while in the scrapbook we begin to see representations of the ‘intrapsychological’. In the video (see transvisuals), Ania (Adam’s mother) explicitly states and demonstrates the appropriate and expected behaviours to the baby (Olivia). She guides and demonstrates what Olivia is expected to do in order to become a participant member of the community, a status which Adam has now achieved, albeit still as a novice. Ania’s interaction with the baby reveals the steps which Adam has gone through. When he repeats the words ‘All the best’, accompanied by the action of eating the egg, Adam is simultaneously an ‘apprentice’ (Lave and Wenger 1991) and a ‘mediator’ (Rogoff 1995). He still needs his mother’s guidance and approval (see eye contact in video still 4) and he is not yet trusted to accept the plate with the blessed egg (this is only handed on to Marta, the aunt, and the other adults). Yet, he demonstrates to his little sister (Olivia) the behaviour that is expected of her. Olivia’s role here, is what Fernyhough (2008, 229) refers to as Vygotskian naïve participation. Following the others’ example, she is guided and takes part in the interaction, even though she does not understand the meaning of what is going on. Throughout the texts, the process of prolepsis (Cole 1996) can be identified in the formalised transmission of knowledge in the home rituals. Both the role adopted by the mother during the video and the cultural and linguistic content of the scrapbook show how Adam’s mother (Ania) adopts a stance of experienced member and teacher transmitting knowledge to her children. The scrapbook was Ania’s initiative and, by involving herself in his learning, she makes sure that he works to best of his ability. In writing the text and choosing the images that form the content of his scrapbook, Adam appropriates the symbolism that imbues the ritual of Easter celebrations and manipulates the metaphorical meaning of the texts. Importantly, Adam is learning the ‘how to’ of apprenticeship into a sociocultural group, through guided participation, modelling and (not always explicit) teaching. He is learning to read cues and signals as well as acquiring social and cultural notions of what represents valuable knowledge. In so doing, Adam is developing multiple layers of his identity as a member of the Polish community and as a member of a faith community. Although he can use traditional forms of literacy, he is becoming proficient in multimodal forms of meaning-making, intertwining and interfacing written-linguistic modes of meaning with oral, visual, audio, gestural, tactile and spatial patterns of meaning (Cope & Kalantzis 2009). This multimodal meaning making matches our understanding that faith literacies are ‘… practices which may include four different aspects: (1) the reading of written texts (scripts), (2) the use of oral texts (discussions about the faith, interaction with a deity or other members of the faith community), (3) the performance of faith through actions (silent or not), and (4) knowledge (including theological, geographical and historical information about the faith)’ (Souza, forthcoming). This view of faith literacies, supported by the illustrations of Adam’s experiences at home, has significant implications for education. For example, questions should be posed as to how pupils’ funds of knowledge can be accessed and how their formal learning can build upon the concepts they bring into school. Through the type of activities here described, children become familiar not only with simple linguistic metaphors but also with the symbology and the higher abstract concepts metaphors can represent. They gain new and powerful thinking tools which should be valued in schools. The examples in this article also show that children’s learning out-ofschool is surrounded by literacy practices that include written and oral texts, performance and application of knowledge. This out-of-school experience calls for the incorporation of multimodal representations into classroom learning, i.e. the creation of a pedagogy of multiliteracies (Cope & Kalantzis, 2009). Given the above, we hope that these discussions and the illustrations in this chapter recruit new converts to the practices of developing links between children’s learning experience at home and at school with a focus on the culture, language, religion and identity of children of migrant backgrounds. Acknowledgement The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the Economic and Social Research Council of Great Britain (ESRC) for the project ‘Becoming literate in faith settings: Language and literacy learning in the lives of new Londoners’ (2009–2013) (RES-062-23-1613), from which this article draws some of its examples. Professor Eve Gregory (Goldsmiths, University of London) directed this project, which had a team of 10 members: John Jessel, Charmian Kenner, Vally Lytra, Mahera Ruby, Ana Souza, Olga Barradas, Halimun Chowdhuri, Amoafi Kwapong, Arani Ilkuberan and Malgorzata Woodham. The authors especially thank Adam and his family for kindly sharing their experiences with them. References Bezemer, Jeff, and Diane Mavers. “Multimodal transcription as academic practice: a social semiotic perspective.” International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 14 (2011): 191-206. doi: 10.1080/13645579.2011.563616 Census Information Scheme. 2011 Census Snapshot: main Language. 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