Associate Professor Helen Nixon

Curriculum Vitae

Helen Nixon is a Key Researcher in the Hawke Research Institute (HRI) and Deputy Director of the Centre for Studies in Literacy, Policy and Learning Cultures within the HRI. Her recent and current research projects are:

ARC DISCOVERY GRANT 2007-2009 Chief investigators: Sue Nichols, Helen Nixon (UniSA) and Partner Investigator Dr Jennifer Rowsell (Rutgers University, USA). RA Sophia Rainbird. Parents' networks: the circulation of knowledge about children's literacy learning. This international and longitudinal study will investigate the networks accessed by parents in different socio-cultural locations searching for knowledge and resources about children’s literacy learning, the roles of organisations in these networks, and the ideas about literacy, pedagogy and parents’ roles circulating through these networks. It is significant in using an innovative methodology to study texts, images, objects, accounts and practices as they flow through family, community and broader national and global networks. It will inform policy and practice in public community service provision and family literacy, enabling social programs to engage all parents more effectively.

INVESTIGATING LITERACY YEARS 4-9: A PILOT STUDY. 2009 Chief Investigators: Helen Nixon, Barbara Comber and Rosie Kerin. Funded by DECS SA. This project pilots ways to comprehensively investigate the literacy requirements and opportunities, and aligned explicit teaching strategies, that are embedded across the learning areas in the middle primary years and first years of secondary schooling. The project aims to assist teachers in the Year 4 to 9 range to investigate and address a number of literacy ‘points of possible disconnection’, e.g. increasing complexity of texts, increasing differentiation of disciplinary knowledge, gaps between traditional ‘schooled’ literacies and the expanded repertoires of literacy required for effective participation in 21st century contexts outside schools. The focusis on teachers’ documenting explicit teaching strategies to effectively support students not demonstrating appropriate learning outcomes because of the increasing complexity of literacy beyond the early years.

DIVISIONAL RESEARCH PERFORMANCE GRANT 2004 Chief Investigator: H. Nixon Teenagers online: the world wide web as a medium for inquiry, communication, construction and expression. This project theorises that the web constructs opportunities for young people to participate in emergent literacy practices that may not be fully intelligible according to categories and typographies familiar from print literacy such as narrative and genre. The project aims to: 1. explore theoretical and practical issues associated with undertaking an ‘ethnography’ of young people’s engagement with the web 2. explore what the analysis of web sites can tell us about a) the kinds of writing/production and interactivity/communication the web makes available for 11-16 year-olds and b) the opportunities this age group takes up. 3. connect the research with emerging international research into ‘online writing’ and literacy and the new media.

ARC LINKAGE GRANT JULY 2004-JULY 2007 Chief Investigators R. Hattam, M. Brennan, B. Comber, P. Cormack, H. Nixon, D. Lloyd, J. Barnett, A. Reid, L. Zipin (UniSA) with Industry Partners, DECS SA Secondary School Principals in the Northern Area of SA, Australian Education Union, Social Inclusion Unit. Reinvigorating middle years pedagogy in 'rustbelt' secondary schools. Internationally, the middle years of schooling are increasingly problematic for students and teachers, and thus a crucial site for pedagogical reform. The last decade of research and development is nearly exhausted. There is a need for a new generation of pedagogical innovation that recognises shifts in demography, identities and socio-economic conditions. The project aims to build curriculum and pedagogical practice that engage young people’s lifeworlds and the concerns of their communities. It will develop a university-school professional learning community that supports educational action research, and that informs pedagogical practices through ethnographies of the everyday lives of diverse young people.

HRISS SEED FUNDING GRANT 2006-2007 Chief Investigators: Helen Nixon, Barbara Comber, Julia de Roeper, Stephen Atkinson, Rosie Kerin. New spaces for learning and research: the social and cultural construction of the Northern Sound System. This project will track the development of the Northern Sound System (NSS), a regional community music centre being established by the City of Playford to support the growth of a resilient community and sustainable region. Through interviews, focus group discussions and a multimedia blog, this collaborative project will document the construction and reception of the NSS by the community, including its target group of school students and youth who want to gain experience in music performance and the digital arts. Participants’ expressions of their emerging identities as musicians and community members in talk and multimedia forms will be explored.

ARC LINKAGE GRANT JULY 2004-JULY 2007 Chief Investigators B. Comber, P. Cormack and H. Nixon (UniSA) and B. Green and J. Reid (Charles Sturt University, Bathurst) with Industry Partner, the Primary English Teaching Association. Literacy and the environment: A situated study of multimediated literacy, sustainability, local knowledges and educational change. The Murray-Darling Basin represents one of the major ecosocial challenges facing Australia. Finding long-term sustainable solutions requires a knowledgeable and literate citizenry and due educational investment now. This study seeks to extend ‘Special Forever’, an innovative environmental communications project, involving the Primary English Teaching Association and The Murray-Darling Basin Commission, designed to enhance primary school children’s knowledge and literacy regarding the Murray-Darling Basin. This research will analyse the Special Forever archive, develop ecosocial cartographies, and document school-based environmental projects through writing, the arts and contemporary multi-media. In doing so, it will extend current understandings of literacy education and the environment.

ARC DISCOVERY NEAR MISS GRANT 2005. Chief investigators: S. Nichols & H. Nixon. Parents information networks. This study investigates the circulation of knowledge about children’s learning and development through parents’ networks, particularly focusing on the role of community services and information workers. Site visits and interviews at three libraries and a community centre, parent surveys, home visits, aretefact collection, digital photography and web-site analysis were used to build a rich picture of information flows, kinds and usage.

MYER FOUNDATION GRANT 2004 Chief Investigators: B. Comber, H. Nixon, J. Cook and S. Loo (UniSA) in partnership with Ridley Grove R-7 School, SA. Urban renewal from the inside-out: Students and community involvement in re-designing and re-constructing school spaces in a poor neighbourhood. This project brings together educators from Ridley Grove R-7 School and the University of South Australia to support teachers to consult with school students and community members to: • Design a garden and structure which connects the school with the pre-school on the same grounds • Involve school students and community members in the design process • Involve UniSA architecture students in the process • Involve UniSA education students in designing curriculum and researching children’s learning • Involve UniSA communication and journalism students in assisting the children and the community to document the project across all phases In the medium term this project will: • Promote the project through the media and seek ongoing support from local businesses and social groups • Construct a garden and structure as designed and negotiated by the children and the community. In the long-term this project will: • Provide a model of community involvement and cross-disciplinary social justice activism which the academic participants will develop and disseminate in collaboration with the school community. • Equip student participants and their families with repertoires of powerful social practices (e.g. negotiation, design, consultation).

Hawke Research Institute for Sustainable Societies

Centre for Studies in Literacy, Policy and Learning Cultures

• Graduate Certificate of Education (New literacies and new technologies in classrooms)
• Master of Education (Language and Literacy Education)
• EdD - Professional Doctorate. Literacy/English education.
• PhD - Literacy/English and media/ICTs

Australian Association for Research in Education

Australian Association for the Teaching of English

Australian Literacy Educators Association

United Kingdom Literacy Association

Editorial Review Board Member, Literacy (UK)

Editorial Board Member,The International Journal of Learning and Media

Editorial Board Member, Digital Culture and Education

PhD (University of Queensland)

MEd (University of Adelaide)

DipEd (University of Adelaide)

BA (Hons) (University of Adelaide)

• Literacy education and social justice
• Popular media culture
• Media education
• English/literacy curriculum
• Literacy and new information and communication technologies(ICTs)

     

Books

Comber, B., Nixon, H. & Reid, J. (Eds.) (2007). Literacies in Place: Teaching environmental communications. Newtown, NSW: Primary English Teaching Association.

Doecke, B., Homer, D., & Nixon, H. (Eds.) (2003). English Teachers at Work: Narratives, counter narratives and arguments. Adelaide: Australian Association for the Teaching of English/Wakefield Press.

                             

Book chapters

Nixon, H. & Comber, B. (in press 2009). Literacy, landscapes and learning in a primary classroom. In M. Somerville, K. Power and P. de Carterer (Eds.) Landscapes and Learning: Place Studies in a Global World. Rotterdam, The Netherlands: Sense Publishers. Accepted 16 July 2009.

Reid, J., Nixon, H. & Comber, B. (2007) Teaching for environmental sustainability: Combining critique with hope. In B. Comber, H. Nixon & J. Reid (Eds.). Literacies in place: Teaching environmental communication (pp. 142-154). Newtown, NSW: Primary English Teaching Association.

Comber, B., Reid, J. & Nixon, H. (2007). Environmental communications: Pedagogies of responsibility and place. In B. Comber, H. Nixon & J. Reid (Eds.). Literacies in place: Teaching environmental communications (pp. 5-18). Newtown, NSW: Primary English Teaching Association.

Nixon, H., Atkinson, S. & Beavis, C. (2006) New media pathways: Navigating the links between home, school and the workplace. In Leo Tan Wee Hin and R. Subramaniam (Eds.) Handbook of Research on Literacy in Technology at the K-12 Level (pp. 118-136), Idea Group Publishing, Hershey, USA.

Nixon, H. (2005) Cultural pedagogies about ICTs and education in a globalised cultural economy. In Apple, M., Kenway, J. & Singh, M. (eds). Globalising education: policies, pedagogies and politics (pp. 45-60). New York: Peter Lang.

Nixon. H. & Comber, B. (2005). Behind the scenes: making movies in early years classrooms. In J. Marsh (Ed.) Popular Culture, New Media and Digital Literacy in Early Childhood (pp. 219 - 236). London: Routledge/ Falmer.

Comber, B. & Nixon, H. (2004) Children re-read and re-write their neighborhoods: critical literacies and identity work. In Janet Evans (Ed.) Literacy moves on: Popular culture, new technologies and critical literacy in the elementary classroom (pp. 127-148). Portsmouth: Heinemann.

Also published as: Comber, B. & Nixon, H. (2005) Children re-read and re-write their neighbourhoods: critical literacies and identity work. In Janet Evans (Ed.) Literacy moves on: Popular culture, new technologies and critical literacy in the primary classroom (pp. 115-132). London: David Fulton Publishers.

Sefton-Green, J., & Nixon, H. (2003). Can 'English' cope? The challenge of popular culture, digital technologies and curriculum change. In B. Doecke & D. Homer & H. Nixon (Eds.), English Teachers at Work (pp. 242-254). Adelaide, SA: Australia Association for the Teaching of English/Wakefield Press.

Nixon, H. (2002). Popular media culture, ICTs and the English language arts curriculum. In R. Hammett and B. Barrell (Eds.) Digital Expressions: Media Literacy and English language Arts (pp. 113-135). Calgary, Canada: Detselig.

Wilson, S., & Nixon, H. (2002). Embedding information and communications technologies into literacy programming. In PETA (Ed.), Practical Literacy Programming (pp. 73-92). Sydney: Primary English Teachers Association.

Nixon, H. (2002). South Park: not in front of the children. In D. Buckingham (Ed.) Small screens: television for children (pp.96-119). London: Continuum.

Nixon, H. (2001). Literacy, ICTs and disadvantage: an 'unspeakable' topic? In C. Durrant & C. Beavis (Eds.), P(ICT)ures of English (pp. 191-209). Adelaide: AATE/Wakefield Press.

Comber, B., & Nixon, H. (1999). Literacy education as a site for social justice: what do our practices do? In C. Edelsky (Ed.), Making justice our project: Teachers working toward critical whole language practice (pp. 316-351). Urbana, Illinois: National Council of Teachers of English.

Nixon, H. (1998). Fun and games are serious business. In J. Sefton-Green (Ed.), Digital diversions: Youth culture in the age of multimedia (pp. 21-42). London: University College London Press.

Journal articles

Comber, B. & Nixon, H. (2009) Teachers’ work and pedagogy in an era of accountability. Discourse:Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education 30(3): 333-345.

Nichols, S., Nixon, H. & Rowsell, J. (2009). The “good” parent in relation to early childhood literacy: symbolic terrain and lived practice. Literacy (UK) 43(2): 65-74. 'Literacy and Identity' special issue.

Nichols, S., Nixon, H., Pudney, V. & Jurvansuu, S. (2009) Parents resourcing children’s early development and learning. Early Years: An International Journal of Research and Development. 29(2): 147-161

Sefton-Green, J., Nixon, H., & Erstad, O. (2009). Reviewing approaches and perspectives on ‘Digital literacy’. Pedagogies: An International Journal. Vol 4, Issue 2, pp. 107-125.

Comber, B. & Nixon, H. (2008) Spatial literacies, design texts and emergent pedagogies in purposeful literacy curriculum. In Pedagogies: An International Journal.3(4). 221-240.

Prosser, B., McCallum, F., Milroy, P., Comber, B. & Nixon, H. (2008) ‘I am smart and I am not joking’: Aiming high in the middle years of schooling. Australian Educational Researcher, 35 (2), 15-36.

Nixon, H. Comber, B & Cormack, P. (2007). River literacies: Researching in contradictory spaces of cross-disciplinarity and normativity. English Teaching: Practice and Critique 6(3)92-111

Erixon, P. & Nixon, H. (2007) Teaching writing in the age of new media. Editorial introduction to Special Issue of L1 –Educational Studies in Language and Literature. 7(4), 1-6.

Nixon, H. (2007). Expanding the semiotic repertoire: environmental communications in the primary school. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, 30(2), 102-117

Thomson, P., Nixon, H. & Comber, B. (2006). A case of intention deficit disorder?: ICT policy, disadvantaged schools and leaders. School Effectiveness and School Improvement Vol 17, no 4, pp. 465-482 (AN 22847872)

Comber, B., Nixon, H., Ashmore, L., Loo, S. & Cook, J. (2006) Urban renewal from the inside out: spatial and critical literacies in a low socio-economic school community. Mind, Culture and Activity. Special issue: Semiotic, Dialogic and Material Spaces, vol 13, no 3, pp. 226-243.

Nixon, H. & Comber, B. (2006). The differential recognition of children’s cultural practices in middle primary literacy classrooms. Literacy, Vol. 40, No 3, November: pp. 127-136.

Atkinson, S. & Nixon, H. (2005) Locating the subject: teens online @ ninemsn. Discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education, Vol. 26, No. 3, September: pp. 387-409.

Burn, A. & Nixon, H. (2005) English Teaching: Practice and Critique Guest editors of Special Issue: English and the Visual. Volume 4, number 1 (May). Editorial: ‘English and the visual: from montage to manga’ http://education.waikato.ac.nz/journal/english_journal/index.php

Kerin, R. & Nixon, H. (2005) Critical literacy and the study of digital texts in the middle years English/literacy curriculum. Literacy Learning: The Middle Years, 13(1), 20-35.

Beavis, C., Nixon, H. & Atkinson, S. (2005) LAN cafes: cafes, places of gathering, or sites of informal teaching and learning? Education, Communication and Information (Routledge UK), 5(1), 41-60. Special issue: New Media, Production Practices, Learning Spaces

Nixon, H. (2003). New research literacies for contemporary research into literacy and new media? Reading Research Quarterly, 38(4), 407-413.

Nixon, H. (2003). Digital technologies: a new era in literacy education? Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 24(2), 261-269.

Nixon, H. (2003) Textual diversity: who needs it? English Teaching: Practice and Critique 2(2) (September) http://www.soe.waikato.ac.nz/english/ETPC/index.html.

Nixon, H. (2002). English/literacy education and consumer-media culture. English in Australia( 133), 68-70.

Comber, B., Badger, L., Barnett, J., Nixon, H., & Pitt, J. (2002). Literacy after the early years: A longitudinal study. The Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, 25(2), 9-23.

Nixon, H. (2001). Dawson's Creek: Sex and scheduling in a global phenomenon. Screen Education, (25), 82-89.

Nixon, H., & Comber, B. (2001). Reviewing literature for adolescents and young adults: critical pedagogy in action? Papers: Explorations into Children's Literature, 11(2), 56-65.

Kenway, J. & Nixon, H. (1999). Cyberfeminisms, cyberliteracies and educational cyberspheres. Educational Theory, Vol. 49, no. 4, Fall.

Nixon, H. (1999). Towards a (cyber)pedagogy for multimedia multiliteracies. In C. Luke (Ed.) Cyber-pedagogy in cyberculture. (Special issue) Teaching Education, 10(2), Spring/Summer, 87-99.

Nixon, H. (1999). Adults watching children watch South Park. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, September, 12-16.

Nixon, H. (1998). Collaborative research partnerships for literacy education in New Times. In B. Green & C. Beavis (Eds.) Researching new literacies, new technologies and new kids in New Times. (Special issue) Australian Educational Researcher, 25(3), 61-82.

Nixon, H. (1996). GP and The X-Files bring the Internet to popular television. Metro, (106), 50-57.

Nixon, H., & Comber, B. (1995). Making documentaries and teaching about disadvantage. Australian Educational Researcher, 22(2), 63-84.

Refereed conference papers

Nichols, S., Nixon, H., Rainbird, S. and Rowsell, J. (2007) Exploring a methodology for tracing spatial, social and textual networks through neighbourhoods, Proceedings of the State of Australian Cities National Conference 2007, Adelaide, 28-30 November 2007, pp. 1-9. Adelaide, University of South Australia. http://www.unisa.edu.au/soac2007/program/papers/0129.PDF

Research reports

Comber, B., Badger, L., Barnett, J., Nixon, H., & Pitt, J. (2001). Socio-economically disadvantaged students and the development of literacies in school. Adelaide: University of South Australia.

Cormack, P., & Nixon, H. (1999). Caroline Chisholm High. In B. Comber & B. Green (Eds.), Information technology, literacy and educational disadvantage research and development project. Vol 2. Site studies. (pp. 51-86). Report to DETE. Adelaide, SA: University of SA.

Comber, B., Badger, L., Nixon, H., & Pitt, J. (1997). Socio-economically disadvantaged students and the acquisition of school literacies: Pilot study. University of South Australia. Report to DECS.

Cormack, P. & Nixon, H. (1996). South Australian case studies: School 10. In M. Dilena and C. Van Krayenoord (Eds.) Whole-school approaches to assessing and reporting literacy. Children’s literacy projects 1993-1994. Report to DEET, vol 1, Case Studies: 257-282.

Multimedia

Nixon, H. & Ryan, P. (1999). IT’s got power: Images and voices from the Information Technology, Literacy and Educational Disadvantage Project. 25 minute teacher professional development video tape produced for the Commonwealth Literacy Team, Equity Standards, DETE SA, August.

Nixon, H. (1997). Who's teaching who about what: Cultural pedagogy and computer-mediated communications. (computer disk) In D. Homer, C. Reynolds & M. Dobbins (Eds.), Information technology in the English classroom Australian Association for the Teaching of English. NPDP Program, Commonwealth of Australia. AATE Publications Office: PO Box 3202, Norwood, South Australia. 5067.

Hill, S. Nixon, H. Comber, B. Badger, L. & Wilkinson, L. (1996). Literacy learning and social justice. 3 videos and booklet. (a) Communities, literacy and schools (23 mins), (b) Teaching and learning at Paralowie R-12 School (17 mins), (c) Literacy assessment in disadvantaged schools (25 mins). Melbourne, Vic: Eleanor Curtain Publishing.

Comber, B., Nixon, H., Hill, S., & Badger, L. (1994). Literacy, diversity and schooling. 3 videos and booklet. (a) Literacy, poverty and schooling (21 mins), (b) Becoming a literacy teacher in a diverse community (17 mins), (c) Teaching literacy in disadvantaged schools (23 mins). Melbourne, Vic: Eleanor Curtain Publishing.