Media Education, Successfully Piloted in the 2017-2018 Academic Year

The Independent Journalism Center invited the female teachers who taught the media education subject during the 2017-2018 to a follow-up activity on 7 June 2018 to share their experience. Loretta Handrabura and Silvia Spac, two of the authors of the curriculum and of the textbook, also participated in the activity. The female teachers who have benefited from training and who are going to teach the subject during the next academic year have also come to find out more from those with experience. Participants in the folow-up reviewed the most important moments they had while teaching ‘Media Education’ the first year. They told about the teaching methods they did apply and how did they work, what was the reaction of children and parents, what difficulties did they encounter and what resources would be needed to make media lessons more effective.
 
Most of the female teachers have involved children in interactive activities, organizing media education activities for parents too. A general remark that they mentioned was the excessive use of computers and mobile phones by children. The women participating in the activity believe that children should be helped to make reasonable use of these tools.
Maria Duplava, teacher at Cigarleni Gymnasium in the same-name village (Ialoveni district), presented a number of online teaching tools that she has also used during media education lessons. Together with the pupils, they have organized several shows for children to better understand how a media institution works. In addition, Ms. Duplava, impressed by this subject, chose to be assessed under the teaching certification for the Media Education subject and conducted a public lesson for her colleagues from the district at a workshop attended by over 30 teachers from Ialoveni. 

Adriana Bujag, teacher at Heritage International School in Chisinau, talked about the use of interactive tools while teaching this subject. During the media education classes each pupil had a tablet that enabled them do more practical exercises. They have written news, made surveys at school and had a meeting with journalist Liliana Barbarosie from Radio Free Europe, who told them about how to write unbiased news. According to the teacher, it’s important for those who teach this subject to be well-informed and motivated, to have a number of resources needed to facilitate the teaching. 
Ludmila Iftodi, from Lalova Gymnasium (Rezina district), told about the difficulties she had overcome in the very beginning, when school’s management rejected this subject. After convincing the parents about the need for media education, she began to teach this subject without being paid. Since the school block for primary forms had no Internet connection, she had to move to another wing of the school to teach media education. She also worked with the parents to make them more attentive to the information their children receive, because ‘parents are more involved in children’s education and spend a lot of time together during the primary forms’, the teacher considers.
Ludmila Malachi, teacher at Viisoara Gymnasium (Stefan Voda district), together with the pupils organised talk shows, debates and other interactive activities, also involved older pupils, and her teacher colleagues were very curious about the subject of media education, since it was quite special and had specific activities. Pupils have now e-mails they have learned to use and are actively involved in organizing media education lessons, and if necessary, parents contribute to providing technical resources for interactive lessons.      

Ina Grejdeanu, Strategic Development Officer at IJC, who moderated the activity and who tried to learn as much as possible about the implementation of the subject, mentioned, inter alia: ‘I was listening very carefully to the teachers who shared their experience of teaching ‘Media Education’ subject, and I was reassured that we are on the right path. At the end of the first academic year, when the optional subject has been implemented in over 20 schools across the country, we have the first results. To the experience the participants told us about, we’ll add new ones, since their enthusiasm motivates us to go further.’ Media education is one of IJC’s strategic directions we aim to further develop. ‘Four years ago we organized the first lesson of media education at Ialoveni, and today we already have an optional subject, taught on the basis of a textbook developed by IJC. In the coming years, we plan to expand the optional media education subject both to gymnasium and lyceum levels. Likewise, we want this subject to be implemented gradually in all schools in the country’, Ina added.

In the end, the female teachers appreciated the event, assessing it as a good opportunity to inspire each other, to take over and exchange good practices, which they’ll apply when teaching the ‘Media Education’ subject. 
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The activity took place under ‘Strengthening Freedom of Opinion in the Republic of Moldova’ Project, supported by the Deutsche Welle Akademie and funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development of Germany.