I’m a senior lecturer in the Faculty of Education at Monash University where I study young people’s use of digital media and the implications this has for English and literacy learning across a range of contexts like school and home (I have a range of other interests – see below).
I teach in the Faculty’s secondary teacher education program, and its honours and masters programs. I’m also currently the Faculty’s Honours Course Leader. I supervise honours, masters and PhD projects and would be happy to speak to potential research students.
Before coming to Monash I was a secondary school English teacher. In addition to my work at Monash, I’m a National Council member for the Australian Association for the Teaching of English (AATE). I have four young children (three sons and a daughter) and live in idyllic Bayswater amongst the factories at the foot of the Dandenongs in Melbourne.
I tweet at @scottbulfin @englishteachers and @LNM_Monash
Research interests:
- Language and literacy in and out of school
- Digital technology in secondary schools
- Critical and sociological approaches to technology
- English teaching theory, practice, and curriculum change
- Narrative; ethnography; discourse analysis
Current research & writing activities
- Digital technology use in secondary schools
- The discursive construction of MOOCs
- Narrative, storytelling and professional learning.
Publications:
Recent journal articles and chapters
Bulfin, S., Henderson, M. & Johnson, N. F. (2013), Examining the use of theory within educational technology and media research. Learning, Media & Technology, 38(3), 337-344 DOI:10.1080/17439884.2013.790315
Parr, G., Bellis, N,. & Bulfin, S. (2013) Teaching teachers for the future: Speaking back to TPACK. English in Australia, 48(1), pp. 9-22.
Bulfin, S & Koutsogiannis, D. (2012) New literacies as multiply placed practices: expanding perspectives on young people’s literacies across home and school. Language and Education, 26(4), pp. 331–346.
Bulfin, S. & McGraw, K (eds) (2011) Technologies, texts and practices: An English in Australia special issue, English in Australia, 46(3), 2-3.
Bulfin, S. & McGraw, K. (2011) My story, our stories. In B. Doecke & G. Parr (Eds.) English for the Australian Curriculum: Books 1 & 2. South Melbourne: Cambridge University Press.
North, S., Snyder, I. & Bulfin, S. (2008) Digital tastes: Social class and young people’s technology use. Information, Communication & Society 11 (7): 895-911.
Bulfin, S. & North, S. (2007) Negotiating digital literacy practices across school and home: Case studies of young people in Australia. Language and Education 21 (3): 247-63.
Recent books
Bulfin, S., Johnson, N., & Bigum, C. (forthcoming) Killer apps: Critical perspectives on education and technology. Palgrave Macmillan.
Bulfin, S. & McGraw, K. (2011) Texts, practices and technologies: An English in Australia Special issue. English in Australia, 46(3).
Recent reports, presentations and other writing
Bulfin, S. Parr, G. & Bellis, N. (2013). English teaching, standards-based reforms and the technological fix. Paper presented at the IAIMTE Conference, 10-13 June, Paris, France.
Parr, G. & Bulfin, S. (2013). Writing, professional learning and identity work. Paper presented at the IAIMTE Conference, 10-13 June, Paris, France.
Selwyn, N., Johnson, N., Bulfin, S. & Henderson, M. (2013) Academic research in education, technology and media: mapping the field. Melbourne: Faculty of Education, Monash University.
Bulfin, S. (2009) Literacies, new technologies and young people: Negotiating the interface in secondary school. Unpublished PhD thesis, Faculty of Education, Monash University.
Bulfin, S. (2009) Cyber-savy students and industrial-era schools? Disassembling and recasting the new home-school mismatch hypothesis. Paper presented at the AATE/ALEA Conference, 9-12 July, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia.
Snyder, I., Wise, L., North, S. & Bulfin, S. (2008) Being digital in school, home and community: Final report. Melbourne: Monash University.
Bulfin, S. (2008) Renegotiating digital literacies in and around the curriculum. Paper presented at the AATE/ALEA Conference, 6-9 July, Adelaide Convention Centre, Adelaide, Australia.
Bulfin, S. (2008) Making do in secondary school: Hidden literacies in the underlife of adolescents. Paper presented at the Monash Educational Research Community (MERC) Conference, 4 July, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.
Snyder, I. & Bulfin, S. (2008) Using new media in the Secondary English Classroom. In D. Leu, J. Corio, M. Knobel & C. Lankshear (eds) Handbook of Research on New Literacies. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Bulfin, S. (2007) Learning (to learn) against the grain? English in Australia 42 (2): 65-68.
Bulfin, S. & Taylor, C. (2007) Cyberkids or slackers? Young people, technology use and literacy learning. Paper presented at the Conference of the Australian Association for the Teaching of English (AATE), Canberra, ACT, Australia, July 2007.
Bulfin, S. (2007) Imagining ‘digital youth’ differently. Teacher: The National Education Magazine, June, 56-7.
Bulfin, S (2007) Screenagers and the net gen. Around the Globe 3 (3): 34.
Snyder, I. & Bulfin, S. (2007) Digital literacy: What it means for Arts education. In Liora Bresler (ed) International Handbook of Research in Arts Education (pp. 1297-1310). Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer.
