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Several projects exploring the role of media literacy and technology in students’ learning are underway this year.
Collaboration using secure chatrooms, webcams and document exchange is being trialled in order to bring more flexibility to learning, and to encourage the sharing of knowledge. Interactive ‘hot-text’ PowerPoint presentations are being developed by students exploring large banks of material, such as poetry anthologies: students can create links between poems, and guide readers to other sources such as webpages and interactive exercises. Creative writing will also be transformed through the use of a collaborative writing engine ( www.theradii.com ), where students can contribute to shared or divergent narratives.
Parkside continues to host visits from Media educators from around the world – for example, last year we welcomed graduates and academics from Sweden. Also last year we were visited by Korean academics, resulting in Parkside being featured on Korean TV. We have recently hosted a follow-up study visit from some twenty Korean Media Studies teachers, funded by the Korean Press Foundation.
We continue to disseminate our innovations in Media Education through publications. Our work with laptop computers and interactive whiteboards has recently been charted in a case study published on the Specialist Schools Trust website www.specialistschools.org.uk. A more in-depth investigation into the benefits of studying film and literature together by James Durran and Craig Morrison will be published in January in the inaugural issue of English, Drama and Media.
As part of a Regional Arts Lottery Programme we continue to deliver an Animation project for Year 6 children. In the last two years this project has run with schools in Norfolk and Suffolk as well as with Cambridge primaries. As the RALP funding comes to an end we are working with local primaries to train staff, in order that they can continue to run such projects independently.
In association with the London Institute of Education and Immersive Education, we are involved in a research and development project on computer games in the classroom. As part of the programme students will eventually be able to engineer their own virtual environment. Parkside staff will be involved in the research arising out of this project.
James Durran, is working with the BFI and London Institute of Education on ‘Progression in Media Literacy at KS3’
Jenny Griffith’s is investigating how Year 6 pupils can use computer animation to more effectively learn French and to evaluate the impact of media based approaches on the development of oral reportoires.
Anne Spink, is investigating the effectiveness of using media technology and practices – specifically filming science experiments with video cameras – to deepen pupil’ understandings of scientific methodology and concepts at Key Stage 2 and 3.
Monty McKeand, is researching into the development and use of a Classics revision website for GCSE students.
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