Methods
Action research
Formative Design-based research
Social Semiotics
Systemic Functional Linguistics
Grounded theory
Content analysis
Inquiry-based research
Research Focus
English curriculum
Writing pedagogy
Multiliteracies
Student Engagement
Multimodal Semiotics
Concepts/Focus
Social Semiotics
Textual construction
Classroom discourse
Multimodality
New Literacies
Katina Zammit is Deputy Dean and Senior Lecturer in the School of Education at Western Sydney University, and member of the Centre for Educational Research. Katina is also President, Australian Literacy Educators Association (ALEA). As well as her involvement in ESJI, Katina has also been a member of the Fair Go Program team since its inception in 2000 working with colleagues on: School is for Me, Engaging Middle Years Boys in Rural Educational Settings, Teachers for a Fair Go funded through the Department of Education and Schooling for a Fair Go funded through HEPP. She has been co-lead investigator onTeaching and leading for Australian schools: A review of the literature project funded by Teaching Australia, and an Office of Teaching and Learning (OLT) grant Defying the odds: Establishing support systems to maximise the success of young people with refugee backgrounds. She has also contributed to the writing of the national Literacy Progressions (ACARA) and revised the recent Guidelines for Accreditation of Initial Teacher Education Programs in Australia (Australian Institute for Teaching & School Leadership (AITSL)), and subsequent workshops on the revised document. Her recent work focuses on the literacy practices of adults in the Zine communities, teacher and student engagement in learning in low socio-economic, culturally and linguistically diverse contexts and classroom discourse. Katina is a qualitative researcher.
Recent Projects
Menzines as literate practice
Contemporary research on men’s post-schooling literacy practices, particularly their writing practices, is sparse. Studies of adult men’s writing both offline and online have typically focused on differences in males’ and females’ writing styles, forms or genres. These investigations have ignored men’s purposes for writing, their writing processes, and the functions that writing can serve in an adult man’s life. Men writing zines represents an emerging area of inquiry that researchers have begun to explore. While zines are stand-alone and complex textual products, zinesters’ print texts are often advertised, extended or supported through posts to their own websites, blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts or other social media. Through their literacy practices, zinesters create culture rather than consume it as they write their zines to share common interests, represent their identities, and form community and solidarity.
Through a social semiotic qualitative multi-case study approach, adult male zinesters’ printed zines were analysed for their textual construction i.e. use of visual and written modes to convey meaning. Other artefacts associated with the production of these texts, such as Facebook, Twitter, also formed part of the data set situating the zines in their social constructed context. Each participant was interviewed about their process and practices of zine production.
The Insider School
The Fair Go projects have focused on changing teaching practices and pedagogies that engage students from low socioeconomic areas in learning and to see education as a potential for their future. While this is important the question is how to achieve whole-school ‘buy-in’. The school is important as it can achieve continuity of educational messages across the years of schooling not just have an impact in a single year in one class. This is partly a question of leadership. However, the project is not focusing on leadership as management but on the intersection of the meso (leadership) and the micro (classroom pedagogy). It will focus on detailing one example of pedagogical leadership that transforms classroom pedagogy and engaging students in learning.
`Building on the work of the Fair Go Program over the years, the project aims to investigate the leadership practices and processes of one primary school that embedded the Fair Go pedagogical frameworks into the school’s action plan over the past two years (2014-2015). In particular it aims to investigate how a pedagogical leader develops a school that makes a difference to students in poverty. All teaching staff, including support teachers, in the school have been involved in implementing action research projects investigating how to change the discourse around engaging messages of either knowledge, ability, control, voice or place or how to create a more ‘Insider Classroom’ utilizing high cognitive, high affective and high operative learning experiences or increasing student self reflection, changing teacher feedback, developing a community of reflection. The school’s leadership team supported staff in implementing their action research projects and the school processes appear to have developed an ‘Insider School’ but what exactly an Insider School entails requires further conceptualization based on research.
Current Projects
Multicities Ethnographies
with Sue Whatman, Lori Beckett, Terry Wrigley and Ian Thomson et al
The project is focusing on cross-country and cross-state research on teacher and student learning engagement and well-being in urban schools. It brings together researchers in Bangor (Wales), Sydney (NSW), Brisbane (Queensland), Scotland and South Australia who are investigating socially just pedagogy, curriculum and assessment that transforms the educational outcomes for students from the early years of schooling to the latter years.
A Fair Go for all: Realising Engaging Messages in classroom discourse
Classrooms deliver powerful messages to students through their curriculum, pedagogy and assessment practices (Bernstein, 1996). These messages are embedded in the enactment or negotiation of learning, the selection of learning experiences and assessments, and the classroom discourse. Engaging messages embedded in the classroom pedagogic discourse provides students enrolled in schools in low socioeconomic areas to perceive themselves as learners and school as a place for them. Drawing on the Fair Go Program’s (2006; Munns, Sawyer & Cole 2013) (FGP) pedagogical concepts this paper will consider how two classroom teachers (Year 1 and Year 3), working in a school where the FGP principles underpinned the school’s strategic plan and professional learning program enacted a pedagogy of engagement and transformation. The FGP pedagogical principles of the Insider Classroom and five discourses of power will be introduced as a means to support teachers to reflect on their practices and investigate changes to their pedagogy to increase students’ engagement in learning and to see education as a potential for them. The paper will also focus on the learning experiences that developed students understanding in the two classrooms that were designed to provide students with high cognitive, high operative and high affective learning that promoted engaging messages to students about their knowledge, ability, control, voice and place. Excerpts from the classroom conversations between the teacher and student/s will be presented that demonstrate the discourse that affirmed these messages.
Recent Publications
Books
Sawyer, W., Munns, G., Zammit, K., Attard, C, & Vass, E. (2018). Engaging schooling: Developing exemplary education for students in poverty. London: Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/Engaging-schooling-Developing-exemplary-education-for-students-in-poverty/Sawyer-Munns-Zammit-Attard-Vass-Hatton/p/book/9781138185081
Tan, L. & Zammit, K. (2018). Teaching writing and representing in the primary school years (2nd Ed). Sydney: Pearson.
Book Chapters
Guzzetti, B. & Zammit, K. (in press). Race, gender and literacy studies: The construction of gender in literacy. In R. Tierney, F. Rizvi, K. Ercikan & G. Smith (Eds.), International Encyclopedia of Education 4e: Literacy and Languages. Oxford: Elsevier.
Zammit, K. (in press). Men’s zines Down Under: Exploring gender, race, and social class through literacies, In B.J. Guzzetti (Ed.), Genders, Cultures and Literacies: Understanding Intersecting Identities. New York, NY: Routledge.
Zammit, K. (2019). Pedagogy, Curriculum and assessment multimodal practices that engage students with and in learning. In H. de Silva Joyce & S. Feez (Eds.), Multimodality across classrooms: Learning about and through different modalities (pp. 49-64). London: Routledge.
Zammit, K. & Sawyer, W. (2018). Teacher development through collaborative research in low SES contexts: a tale of two schools. In S. Gannon, R. Hattam, & W. Sawyer (Eds.), Resisting Educational Inequality: Reframing Policy and Practice in Schools Serving Vulnerable Communities (pp. 122-130).
Zammit, K. (2018). Case study – whole school project: Flatland Public School. In Sawyer, W., Munns, G., Zammit, K., Attard, C, & Vass, E. Engaging schooling: Developing exemplary education for students in poverty. London: Routledge. (pp. 77-90).
Attard, C., Zammit, K. & Sawyer, W. (2018). From Tuesday on. In Sawyer, W., Munns, G., Zammit, K., Attard, C, & Vass, E. Engaging schooling: Developing exemplary education for students in poverty. London: Routledge. (pp. 15-27).
Sawyer, W. & Zammit, K. (2017). Implications and what next? In Sawyer, W., Munns, G., Zammit, K., Attard, C, & Vass, E. Engaging schooling: Developing exemplary education for students in poverty. London: Routledge. (pp. 149-158)
Zammit, K. (2018). Case study – whole school project: Grassland Public School. In Sawyer, W., Munns, G., Zammit, K., Attard, C, & Vass, E. (2018). Engaging schooling: Developing exemplary education for students in poverty. London: Routledge. (pp. 79-87)
Zammit, K. & Vickers, M. (2017). Mentors and mentees working together to develop institutional capital: The Equity Buddies support network. In V. Plows and B. Whitburn (Eds.), Inclusive education: Making sense of everyday practice. Rotterdam, Netherlands: Sense Publishers. (pp. 127-140).
Zammit, K., Vickers, M., Hibbert, E. & Power, C. (2017). Equity Buddies: Building communities of practice to support the transition and retention of students through their first year at university. In J. McDonald and A. Cater-Steel (Eds.), Implementing Communities of Practice in Higher Education. Singapore: Springer. (pp. 373-394).
Tan, L. & Zammit, K. (2016). Defining language and literacy in Teaching Writing and Representing in the Primary School Years, in L. Tan & K. Zammit (Eds.) Teaching writing and representing in the primary school years. Sydney: Pearson. (pp 3-12).
Tan, L. & Zammit, K. (2016). Using digital media for composing multimodal texts in L. Tan & K. Zammit (Eds.) Teaching writing and representing in the primary school years. Sydney: Pearson. (pp 187-198).
Tan, L. & Zammit, K. (2016). New media literacies in children’s online writing in L. Tan & K. Zammit (Eds.) Teaching writing and representing in the primary school years. Sydney: Pearson. (pp 199-212).
Zammit, K. & Tan, L. (2016). The teaching and learning cycle in composing multimodal texts in Teaching Writing and Representing in the Primary School Years, in L. Tan & K. Zammit (Eds.) Teaching writing and representing in the primary school years. Sydney: Pearson. (pp 43-59).
Zammit, K., Chatterjee, R & Gibbs, B. (2016). Composing persuasive multimodal texts in an integrated unit in L. Tan & K. Zammit (Eds.) Teaching writing and representing in the primary school years. Sydney: Pearson.
Journal Articles
Xu, W. & Zammit, K. (2020). Applying thematic analysis to education: a hybrid approach to interpreting data in practitioner research, International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19, 1-9. https://doi-org.ezproxy.uws.edu.au/10.1177/1609406920918810
Tan, L., Zammit, K., D’warte, J & Gearrside, A. (2020). Assessing multimodal literacies in practice: a critical review of its implementations in educational settings, Language and Education, DOI: 10.1080/09500782.2019.1708926
Guzzetti, B. & Zammit, K. (2019). Men writing their lives: Situating the authoring processes of zinesters. Journal of Language and Literacy Education, 15(2), 1-24.
Zammit, K. (2018). “We’re all real serious filmmakers”: Learning about and creating multimodal mini-documentaries. English Teaching: Practice and Critique, 17 (4), 371-386. https://doi.org/10.1108/ETPC-11-2017-0161
Lirola-Martinez, M. & Zammit, K. (2017). Disempowerment and inspiration: A multimodal discourse analysis of immigrant women in the Spanish and Australian online press. Critical Approaches to Discourse Analysis across Discipline, 8 (2), 58-79. http://www.lancaster.ac.uk/fass/journals/cadaad/volume-8-2/
Vickers, M., McCarthy, F. & Zammit, K. (2017). Refugee background students, intercultural relations and academic success in a University context, International Journal of Intercultural Relations, available online: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0147176717301980 doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2017.04.015
Zammit, K. (2017). National testing in schools: An Australian assessment Edited by B. Lingard, G. Thompson & S. Sellar. [Book Review], British Journal of Educational Studies, 65 (3), 420-423. DOI: 10.1080/00071005.2017.1353313
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00071005.2017.1353313
DOI: 10.1080/00071005.2017.1353313
Zammit, K. (2017). iPads, apps and multimodal text creation. Literacy Learning: The Middle Years, 24(2), 8-XX.
Zammit, K. (2013). Using information and communication technologies to engage students in the later years of schooling in learning content and literacy: Case studies of three teachers. Education and Information Technologies, 18 (2), 205-214. DOI 10.1007/s10639-012-9238-4
OTHER PUBLICATION OUTPUTS
Research Reports
Zammit, K. (2013). Evaluation of the delivery of Royal Far West School’s Solve It! Program. Royal Far West School.
Vickers, M. & Zammit, K. (2011). Defying the odds: Establishing support systems to maximise the success of young people with refugee backgrounds at the University of Western Sydney and other Australian universities. ALTC Innovation and Discovery grant
Halse, C., Denson, N., Howard, S. & Zammit, K. (2010). The Centre for Learning Innovation/ Avaya immersive environment project: Evaluation study and report. Sydney: Centre for Learning Innovation.
Cole, B., Mooney, M., Munns, G., Power, A., Sawyer, W., & Zammit, K. (2009). Engaging Middle Years Boys in Rural Educational Settings Project: A Report submitted to the Priority Schools Programs and Equity Coordination Unit (New South Wales Department of Education and Training). Sydney: NSW Department of Education and Training.
Zammit, K., Sinclair, C., Cole, B., Singh, M., Costley, D., Brown A’Court, L., et al. (2007). Teaching and leading for quality Australian Schools: A review and synthesis of research-based knowledge. Canberra: Teaching Australia: Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership.
Curriculum Resources and Materials
Contributed to the writing of:
National Literacy Progressions (ACARA) Guidelines for Accreditation of Initial Teacher Education Programs (revised 2020) (AITSL)
ESJI Research Group 