Media Studies

Why love Media?

In the Sci-Fi film called The Matrix, the main character Neo goes about his everyday life until one day he meets Morpheus who offers him a choice of two pills: the red pill and the blue pill. Morpheus tells Neo that the red pill will free him from the dream world he is currently living in and allow him to escape to the ‘real world’. Taking the blue pill will allow Neo to remain blissfully ignorant of the constructed reality he lives in. If you study Media, you are choosing the red pill. You are choosing to become consciously aware of the Media’s roles in constructing ‘reality’ for you, in presenting a version of the truth that will not be telling us the whole story.  If you study Media you will escape to the ‘real’ world, and become a media-savvy individual who questions rather than accepts the messages that the media bombards us with.

Big Ideas in Media

Media is based around four very big ideas which are common to all media products: Representation (the messages that a media product communicates about people, places or events); Media Language (how features such as colour, sound, costume and props communicate meaning); Media Industries (the businesses and companies who are involved in the production of media products); Media Audiences (the specific groups of people that a media product is aimed at). Whether analysing a media product such as a film or magazine or whether creating your own media product, consideration of these four big ideas is key to both successful understanding and successful creation of a media product.

Why study Media?

The media industry is growing! It is estimated that by 2025 the UK media industry alone will be worth £88billion. This means that it is an area where the jobs market will continue to grow. Studying media at either key stage 4 or 5 is an ideal introduction to this growth industry which impacts our lives on a daily basis. In addition, the media bombards us with messages about the world, the people in it (and our own place in that world). But what if the messages that we receive from the internet, social media, TV, etc only tell us half of the truth? Studying Media enables students to look beyond the images, the words, the colours and the music that make up media products and to identify the messages encoded in these visual and auditory elements.  It empowers students to recognise these messages and understand how an audience is expected to respond to these messages The Media is gaining more and more power in telling young people how to behave, how to look, what is ‘right’ and what is ‘wrong’, what is ‘cool’ and what is not. The study of Media provides young people with the knowledge and skills to recognise these messages as versions of the truth that they have the power to accept or reject.

Challenge

In choosing Media at either Key Stage 4 or 5, students are immediately setting themselves a challenge by studying a subject that is entirely new to them. Moreover, Media is challenging because it involves both analytical and creative elements. Rather than simply watching a film or playing a video game or reading a magazine, students of Media have to train themselves to analyse these products that (up until this point) they have simply used for pleasure.  For example, watching a film becomes an analytical exercise in how colour, music and setting are used to manipulate the audience’s response. In addition, students of Media have to apply this understanding to their own practical productions which could involve producing a short film or selected pages of a magazine. This brings additional challenges as students have to master the hardware and software that will enable them to produce media products of excellent quality.  All of this makes Media an extremely challenging but also rewarding subject.

Vocabulary (Tier 2 & 3)

Knowledge Organisers are used for important key words and ideas in Media Studies.  These are an easy and accessible way for students to learn and reference the subject-specific vocabulary that will enable students to become specialists in Media.  Students learn a vast array of subject specific terminology relating to the four key areas of the media framework: audience, industry, media language and representation.

Numeracy (if applicable)

An important part of Media Studies involves the study of audience and this often involves numbers. In Key Stage 4, Media students will develop their understanding of audiences through the study of numerical data (such as percentages) and graphs (pie charts, bar charts, etc). Students will also develop their numerical skills in Media through accessing the numerical audience data found on a variety of audience research websites such as BARB and RAJAR.

Links with other subjects

Media shares links with some extremely diverse subjects. Like English Language and Literature, Media students are expected to decode language in order to understand the deeper meanings encoded within the text. The only difference is that a media ‘text’ could mean a music video or a film or a print advert and ‘language’ means much more than words:  it means all of the aspects that make up a media product such as the colours, the costumes, the settings and the music.  Like IT, Media involves learning how to use the hardware and software necessary for the production of a media product whether this is using video cameras to film and Adobe Premier to edit or cameras to take photographs and Adobe Photoshop to manipulate and edit these images.

Assessment in Media

Key Stage 4 Media is a BTEC course and, as such, the students are formally assessed at various points across Years 10 and 11 with the opportunity to re-sit some of the assessments if necessary. Two of the assessments (components 1 & 2) are released by the exam board and give a set amount of learning hours in order to complete the assessments during class time under controlled conditions. These assessments are marked internally and moderated by the exam board. The final component (component 3) is completed during lessons under exam conditions and the work is then sent to the exam board for external marking.