Situated data encounters: how teachers animate (and are animated by) data visualisations in literacy coaching work

Digital learning materials and digital testing have become pervasive in Danish primary and lower secondary classrooms. These digital learning materials and tests offer teachers with quick overviews of student performance through data visualisations. However, few studies have examined the role of these types of data visualisations in shaping teachers’ practices. In this article, we explore how teachers animate (and are animated by) data visualisations in literacy coaching work. The article offers a situated account of teachers’ encounters with data visualisations, based on empirical material generated through one year-long ethnographic fieldwork at two Danish primary and lower secondary schools. We employ the feminist new materialist concept of ‘animacy’ by Mel Y. Chen to analyse how data visualisations are transformative and shifting when engaged through teachers’ practices. To analyse the liveliness or animacies of data visualisations, we experiment with different animacies found in monster figures and otherworldly phenomena. In doing so, we demonstrate that data and their visualisations, through teachers’ engagements, behave as shades, (hibernating and awakening) beasts, zombies, and x-rays.