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Making visible the literacy practices of elders through the day in the life methodology: considerations for literacy education across the lifespan
Author(s) -
Heydon Rachel,
Stooke Roz,
Cameron Catherine Ann,
Cooper Emma,
O'Neill Susan
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
literacy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.649
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 1741-4369
pISSN - 1741-4350
DOI - 10.1111/lit.12208
Subject(s) - literacy , thriving , everyday life , critical literacy , literacy education , pedagogy , posthuman , sociology , psychology , curriculum , social science , aesthetics , political science , philosophy , law
This pilot study uses ‘ day in the life ' methodology to observe the everyday literacy practices of a self‐identified thriving elder. Through the case of one nonagenarian female residing in an assisted living community in the United States, we identified the multimodal, posthuman nature of this elder's literacies, exploring how they were connected to a sense of well‐being and the types of literacies that remain relevant across the lifespan. We further consider what the insights gained from such a study might teach about literacy education more generally. We advocate for education that keeps open people's literacy options across the lifespan through acknowledging and cultivating the myriad interrelated constituents of literacies, including the physical, social and political.