Dr Becky Parry
School of Education
Lecturer
+44 114 222 8141
Full contact details
School of Education
Edgar Allen House
241 Glossop Rd
Sheffield
S10 2GW
- Profile
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Becky is Programme Director of the new MA Digital Literacies, Culture and Education and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Becky is also a leading scholar in the emerging field of children’s film scholarship, focusing on gender and the representation of children and childhood in international films for children. Her research is situated within interdisciplinary studies of literacies and particularly focuses on the relationship between the digital texts children engage with and those that they create.
- Research interests
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Becky is a scholar of children’s media cultures. Her research is situated within interdisciplinary studies of literacies and particularly focuses on the relationship between the digital texts children engage with and those that they create. This research recognises that literacy is dynamic and that digital media has created new opportunities and spaces for the making and sharing of texts. Becky’s award winning research has important implications for education, and she advocates for curriculum change and new approaches to pedagogy which acknowledge the value of children’s creative and cultural lives outside of school.
Becky works alongside children and young people,especially those whose experiences are frequently marginalised. Her research draws on qualitative methods including action research, media production and participatory approaches.
Becky researches children’s film in particular and is a Board Member for the European Children's Film Association. Recent publications in this area, focus on gender and the representation of children and childhood in international films for children.
Current Projects
Becky is currently leading research for two XR Stories projects funded by the AHRC. XR Stories is a £15M investment by AHRC, the University of York, the British Film Institute and Screen Yorkshire which supports research and development for companies working in cutting-edge digital technologies in the Yorkshire and Humber region.
- Storyland: This project uses participatory collaborative design with children to develop a new inclusive storytelling approach in Virtual Reality for children and is a partnership with Cooperative Innovations. Becky is working with colleague, Dr Aneesh Barai, to develop recommendations for participatory and collaborative design in VR.
- Awesome Animals: In this project Becky is working with colleague, Dr Liz Chesworth to support Fettle Animation in developing a new resources in Augmented Reality for young children. The aim will be to increase the extent to which the experience supports play and creativity for young children.
Becky is also currently undertaking a residency at The National Videogame Museum in Sheffield, with the aim of supporting the development of a research engaged education programme.
Professional Memberships
Member of the Board for ECFA The European Children’s Film Association (Current)
Member of the United Kingdom Literacy Association Digital Literacies Task Force (Current)
Member of the UKLA/Wiley Blackwell Research in Literacy Education Award Committee (2013-2016)
Member of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Review College (2013-2017)
Participant in COST Action IS1410, ‘The Digital Literacy and Multimodal Practices of Young Children’ (DigiLitEY)
Regular reviewer for Palgrave Macmillan, Bloomsbury and Routledge and for journals including Literacy, Children and Media and Media Education Research and Film Education.
- Publications
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Books
- Children, Film and Literacy. Palgrave Macmillan UK.
Edited books
- Literacy, Media, Technology Past, Present and Future. London: Bloomsbury Academic.
Journal articles
- Emergent digital authoring: playful tinkering with mode, media, and technology. Theory Into Practice.
- Negotiated, contested and political: the disruptive Third Spaces of youth media production. Learning, Media and Technology. View this article in WRRO
- Treading softly in the enchanted forest : exploring the integration of iPads in a participatory theatre education programme. Pedagogies: An International Journal. View this article in WRRO
- Guest editorial: Young children’s engagements with digital media. Media Education Research Journal, 8(2), 5-9. View this article in WRRO
- Conceptualising digital technology integration in participatory theatre from a sociomaterialist perspective: ways forward for research. Research Papers in Education. View this article in WRRO
- Readers in the round: children's holistic engagements with texts. Literacy, 52(2), 103-110. View this article in WRRO
- Reading ads, reading the world. Education 3-13, 44(3), 325-338.
- Popular culture, participation and progression in the literacy classroom. Literacy, 48(1), 14-22.
- Moving stories: Exploring children's uses of media in their story telling and the implications for teaching about narrative in schools. English Teaching, 9(1), 58-72.
- Children playing and learning in an online environment: a review of previous research and an examination of six current web sites. Young Consumers, 10(1), 17-34.
- Reading and rereading ‘Shrek’. English in Education, 43(2), 148-161.
Chapters
- Finding the Hidden Child: The (Im)Possibility of Children’s Films, The Palgrave Handbook of Children's Film and Television (pp. 567-583). Springer International Publishing
- Researching children’s play and identity in the digital age, The Routledge Handbook of Digital Literacies in Early Childhood (pp. 442-452). Routledge
- Time Travels in Literacy and Pedagogy: From Script to Screen In Parry B, Burnett C & Merchant G (Ed.), Literacy, Media, Technology
Past, Present and Future London: Bloomsbury Academic.
- Helping Children Tell the Stories in Their Heads In Bazalgette C (Ed.), Teaching Media in Primary Schools (pp. 89-101). London: SAGE Publications Ltd.
Book reviews
- Using film to understand childhood and practice. Educational Review, 72(1), 133-135.
- Children, Film and Literacy. Palgrave Macmillan UK.
- Research group
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#supervisionaries - stories of brilliant doctoral supervision
From the moment Becky became my supervisor I felt supported, challenged and valued. She answered my queries, acknowledged my stresses and actively listened. Becky is inspirational and an asset to the University of Sheffield.
- Teaching interests
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Becky is the Programme Director for the MA Digital Literacies, Culture and Education and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Becky is also a experienced secondary teacher of English, Drama and Media and has a previous professional career in film and media education, including the establishment of a children’s film festival and a city wide youth journalism project.
Becky now supervises doctoral studies in film and media, digital literacies and education and is especially interested to hear from new candidates for the EdD or Phd doctoral routes who are keen to study children’s media cultures, digital literacies and creative pedagogies.
- Professional activities
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- Member of the United Kingdom Literacy Association
- Member of the UKLA/Wiley Blackwell Research in Literacy Education Award Committee
- Member of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Review College
- Participant in COST Action IS1410, ‘The Digital Literacy and Multimodal Practices of Young Children’ (DigiLitEY)
- Regular reviewer for Palgrave Macmillan, Bloomsbury and Routledge and for journals including Literacy, Children and Media and Media Education Research and Film Education.