Media Studies

Intent of the Media Studies Curriculum

Media studies has never held greater global relevance or significance, making studying this subject both exciting and widely applicable to contemporary culture.  The media, as a whole, affects every single person in some way or another. At The Community College, we believe that a quality media curriculum should develop a student’s understanding of how people become informed – or misinformed – by media products, and how the ideologies that govern our lives are created and sustained. In delivering media studies as an option subject, we aim to develop our students’ confidence in critically engaging with the nine media forms, by analysing media texts with a variety of historical contexts. Furthermore, we aspire to expand our students’ cultural capital, by analysing media texts from across the globe, as well as delving into regulation of the media and how media texts can be purposefully manipulative.

As part of the non-exam assessment, students will be given an exciting opportunity to independently approach a topic of their choice within the OCR stipulated task. This independent coursework task allows students to creatively design and produce a media product of their own, and actively apply the theoretical approaches that they have acquired across the course. The freedom of personal choice in their design represents the overriding intent of the media course, which is to encourage passionate, personal interaction with this vast, creative and constantly shifting industry.

Our aim is to encourage critical evaluation skills and personal approaches, as students will reflect and analyse the role the media has played in their own lives, whilst considering the intent from the media producer.

Implementation of the Media Studies Curriculum

These aims are embedded throughout our schemes of work. We have a rigorous and well-organised curriculum, with critical thinking at the heart of everything we do. The media curriculum is underpinned by an engagement with the key concepts of media studies: the theoretical framework. Students study core media texts, which will be used as a representative example of a specific sub-category of media texts, which are designed to invite close scrutiny and evaluation. For example, studying both ‘The Avengers’ and ‘Cuffs’, which are part of the Crime Drama genre.

Our formative assessments are designed to support students in achieving fluency across all topics. This means that, in lessons, students are quizzed on prior knowledge, in order to embed this into their long-term memory. This consists of 5-a-day starters, online definition quizzes and recall tasks. In doing so, their working memory is freed up to attend to current learning. The media curriculum includes a deliberate focus on broadening students’ media technical language, something that is supported by our knowledge organisers, as students are actively encouraged to experiment with the application and use of technical and theoretical terminology throughout their studies.

The development of analytical skills, across Year 10 and Year 11, also builds the required familiarity with the rigorous requirements of the GCSE exams. Frequent and purposeful practice of key exam questions and styles are built in for fortnightly review. Exam responses are initially modelled as a class, before students formulate responses collaboratively with their peers. Then, when they’re confident, they embark on completing responses individually. Tutorial videos have been created for the media department’s YouTube site, which facilities home learning activities, whilst highlighting the importance of annotating the set text, as well as planning prior to writing their response.

Furthermore, we look for opportunities to invite in speakers, who work within media industries, in order to inspire and inform our students on how they build a successful career in the media. We will also be trialling BBC’s Young Reporter scheme at KS3, to raise awareness of ‘fake news’ and how demographics are represented in the media.

Our approach to teaching and learning supports our curriculum by ensuring that lessons prepare students for the non-exam assessment, giving students the opportunity to think creatively every lesson, with the addition of a challenge or extension task. Furthermore, plenary tasks are often framed as creative activities, to allow our students to implement the theories they’ve discussed and analysed within the lesson.

Impact of the Media Studies Curriculum

As a result of our intent and implementation, we have a student community who feel confident in discussing the big questions the media has raised. Media studies is seen as one of the most defining and diverse subjects available, which is reflected in the popularity of the course and the enthusiasm displayed by the students in lessons.

Through our thorough curriculum planning, our students are able to draw upon historical contexts to explore representations in the media and the role it has on shaping society, as well as developing their analytical responses on the messages and values media producers wish to convey.

To ensure all students successfully master the level of analysis, theories and vocabulary within the course, teachers regularly monitor and assess their core knowledge, through both formative and summative assessments. All students are familiar with GCSE style written assessments, which mirror the expectations of the final Year 11 papers. Assessment data is used to judge the success of the curriculum and progress towards mastery, with teaching time allocated to the re-teaching of specific knowledge. Particularly in Year 11, a large proportion of curriculum time is given to interleaved revision of the broad curriculum content, to ensure that the students are confident to approach and respond to each area of the course. Assessment for learning is at the heart of future planning, with the intention of ensuring all students are equipped with the skills to reach, at least, their target grade.

Within the curriculum, there are frequent cross-curricular references, including English Language, history, politics, psychology and sociology. This broadens the spectrum of opportunities available to our students, as they progress into further education. The impact of building students’ passionate and purposeful engagement in media studies is assessed through students’ engagement with media texts outside of the classroom. Through the inclusion of such a varied, diverse range of close study products, students are given a sense of the huge range of careers involved in an innovative, ever-changing media industry and will consequently be able to consider this as a potential option for their further study.