International Journal of Media and Information Literacy

61-67

Authors: Chi-kim Cheung, Connie Chau

We live in a world that is saturated with mass media, consumed on a daily basis. Students spend a lot of time on media and they are susceptible to the messages conveyed by the media. What can teachers do? Schools must help students develop their analytical and critical thinking skills, so that they can evaluate critically information that relates to important issues that affect the community and the implementation of media literacy education is called upon (Cheung, 2004; Considine et al., 2009). Through the questionnaire survey and also interviews of teachers, this study identifies the major reasons and problems of implementing media literacy education in English curriculum at junior secondary level. Most of the teachers perceived the flexible content of English language and the close relationship between the teaching of English four skills and media literacy education were factors favoured the implementation in the English curriculum. And the major limitations observed by the respondents are: the lack of time, heavy workload and the lack of teacher training.

79-89

Authors: Alexander Fedorov

The analysis of the articles of magazine Cinema Art – 1967 identified the following key film criticism trends: - Despite the folding thaw effects, the magazine tried to keep the ideological position of the late 1950s – early 1960s; - The authors of the magazine tried to analyze the most notable works of the Soviet cinema, even criticized certain shortcomings in the films of famous and influential at that time masters of the screen; - Paying tribute to the inevitable Soviet propaganda rhetoric, the magazine could afford to publish informative theoretical and sociological discussion, and the texts of outstanding script; - However, in some cases, the magazine could (perhaps by order "from above") cause painful a critical blow to the talented work screen. In general, the Cinema Art (1967) was a kind of typical model of the Soviet humanities journals (with the entire obligatory bow to censorship) that try to stay in the position of "socialism with a human face".

99-103

Authors: Imre Szíjártó

The starting point of the study is that blogs show peculiar culture-historical processes determined by web2 communicational medium, represented in the film comprehension strategies and language use of the authors speaking. The study examining comprehension strategies represented in the texts of blogs. Electronic environment has thoroughly altered possibilities of public address: while it was critics of journals who spoke about films, literature or theatre before Internet appeared, nowadays we are faced with imperspicuous variety of sites. Democratisation of communication has its impact on meaning formation practice of reception communities, after all on the processes of the formation of the cultural canon. It is worth dealing with the topic in media-language and art pedagogical context as on the one hand we are witnesses of the transformation of the language of film critics, on the other hand schools have to adapt pre-knowledge and the interpretation strategies of students formed by blogs.

3-8

Authors: Irina V. Chelysheva, Galina V. Mikhaleva

The article presents a brief review of basic approaches to media education in Russia from the genesis to present-day conditions of Russian media pedagogy. The historical analysis of media education in Russia has shown that Russian media education tradition relies on several dominant theoretical approaches such as the semiotic, culturological, aesthetic, ethical, sociocultural and critical thinking development conceptions. The study of artistic value of media production, a close link between the aesthetic approach with spiritual and moral education of the rising generation, reliance on children’s creative skills have provided the basis for many media education models realized in contemporary Russia. Contemporaneous researches focus on studying media culture, various media effects and forms of media addiction, Internet safety and digital competences. Media culture as a vast layer of human culture is also in the focus of media researches. The solution to these problems depends both on teaching the younger generation basic computer skills for digital safety and on elaborating strategies for developing children’s media competence, spiritual and moral values, critical thinking and analytical skills, social skills in the world of media culture. Potential research prospects of media education involve further development of scientific media education centers and schools promoting the investigation of urgent media pedagogy issues.

16-37

Authors: Alexander Fedorov, Anastasia Levitskaya

Based on media education activities’ techniques, the authors taught a media education course during the full academic year. The research objective was to trace the changes between the levels of students’ media competence in a control and in an experimental group. The determination of the media competence’s levels was based on the classification of the indicators of the development of an individual’s media competence developed by our research team. Media competence implies the accumulation of motives, knowledge, abilities, and skills (indicators: motivational, contact, information, perceptual, interpretative / evaluative, practice-operational / activity, creative), facilitating the use, critical analysis, evaluation and communication of media texts in various forms and genres, the analysis of complex processes of media functioning. In line with this interpretation of the media competence, the students were asked to answer 5 units of questions and do the assignments. 90 students (average age of students: 20–21 years old) participated in the experiment: 45 students (14 male and 31 female) of the control group, who did not attend the media education course, and 45 students (14 male and 31 female) of the experimental group, who attended media educational classes. Our research showed that at the beginning of an academic year there was no significant difference in the levels of media competence development between the students of the control and experimental groups. The ratio of young men and women in the control and experimental groups, in our opinion, is typical for Russian pedagogical universities, where for many decades male students have consistently been a minority (from 10 % to 30 % of a class). The classification of the media competence's development indicators developed by us turned out to be an effective tool for comparative analysis between the control and experimental groups. This analysis has proved the effectiveness of the model developed by us and the methodology for fostering students' media literacy (the level of media competence of the students who took and passed a one-year course in media education was four times higher than the level of similar indicators in the control group).

46-58

Authors: Reynaldo Gacho Segumpan, Joanna Soraya Abu Zahari

Interpretive discussions on asynchronous online interactions in an Omani academic setting seem to be muted in the literature. The purpose of this phenomenological research was to understand the meanings constructed by Omani International Business Administration (IBA) students enrolled in Electronic Commerce (MANG2402) class as regards their confabulations using Facebook as a platform of interaction. We examined the written reflective narratives of 25 IBA students describing their lived experiences of asynchronous online marketing exercise during Spring 2015 Semester at the College of Applied Sciences – Rustaq, Sultanate of Oman. Our analyses of data surfaced the following main themes: (a) Facebook Engagement as a Space for Information Dissemination; (b) Facebook Engagement as a Node for Building Relationships; (c) Facebook Engagement as a Boost for Business Engagement; (d) Facebook Engagement as a Concave of Knowledge and Skills which consisted of the following sub-themes: Acquiring Subject-specific Knowledge, Gaining General Knowledge, and Developing Communication Skills; and, (e) Facebook Engagement as an Avenue for Wholesome Entertainment