Rewriting Goldilocks: Emergent Transliteracies
Research on Multiliteracies

At Joyce Public School, known as "Main Street School" in research publications, children in the primary grades are telling old stories in new ways. The project: Rewriting Goldilocks: Emergent Transliteracies is a collegial school-university research project to develop multiliteracies, coordinated by Heather Lotherington at the Faculty of Education, York University and the principal, teachers and technician of Joyce Public School.

Our project is a study of multiliteracies: new directions in literacy that incorporate multiculturalism, multilingualism and multimodalism. Rewriting Goldilocks is designed to provide children with a better understanding of narratives by guiding them into the story as co-authors rather than teaching them as readers external to the world of the story, which digital media facilitate. The project bridges traditional reading and writing practices and contemporary digital literacies, and makes the story of Goldilocks more inclusive of contemporary social diversity. Our approach to story retelling using digital media is intended to close some of the language, literacy and cultural gaps facing children whose backgrounds are not reflected in the Ontario curriculum.

Childrenís rewritten stories provide many new twists to the tale of Goldilocks and the Three Bears!

Projects

The students created their projects using software called HyperStudio. The projects can be view online via the web page. Before you can view the projects, your web browser must have the: HyperStudio Powered Plug-in To get the plug-in, please, download and install one of the following: Mac OS HS45.sit.hqx (2.1M) Windows HSplugin45setup.exe (5.5 M) Note: After installing, please quit and reopen your web browser. To find out more about the "HyperStudio Powered Plug-in", please visit the description page, here.

Braidylocks (click to view) In "Braidylocks”, Goldilocks is reinterpreted as a little black girl with braids. However, for the most part, children incorporated their own understanding of culture into the stories, which came from contemporary media and pop culture.

Sugi (click to view) "Sugi” is a space explorer who eats stuff that kids actually like, such as jello. After all, what does "porridge” mean to a 7 or 8 year old child raised in Vietnam - or India or China or Peru - and Canada?

Stinky Robber The “stinky robber” version of Goldilocks envisions her as a boy and a robber - which is a true interpretation of the (click to view) basic character if not of the gender. However, this robber is rather timid when he is found by the three bears, who having discovered that he has eaten their soup decide he must be hungry and invite him to have some more with them.

Urban Goldilocks Likewise, “Urban Goldilocks” is understood by the three bears to be a neglected child needing attention, which they provide after discovering her in baby bearís bed: (click to view) she is fed and walked home. Next year baby bear comes for a sleep-over. This unorthodox story ending provides a compassionate conflict resolution to what is a timeless problem: dealing with the intrusive behaviour of children who go where they are not supposed to go and do what they are not entitled to do.

Sharky “Sharky”, as the rewritten Goldilocks protagonist is, on the other hand, a bully: a common character in life and especially on the (click to view) playground. The Sharky rewrite twists the tale of the three bears in other directions: Sharky, the shark enters the home of three fish and breaks babyís things as in the original story but prefers papaís food to babyís food, as well as papaís chair and bed: Sharky is an inflated character who makes inflated choices. When he is discovered, he gives the ultimate in bullying performances: he eats the three fish, too, and lives happily every after!

Our project is expanding in 2005-2008 with the support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. Next year, children in more primary grades will be rewriting more stories involving a wider range of technology - in multiple languages.