Media citizenship and the mediatization of school: Curriculum, teaching material, teachers
Recently, the school s views on democracy, freedom of speech and criticism of sources have been adjusted to concepts of "media literacy" or, in Swedish, "medie- och informationskunnighet" (MIK). Guidelines for a "MIK-curriculum" for teacher's education have been developed by UNESCO. Policy actors (municipalities, teachers compartment) are increasingly interacting with commercial interests (Apple, Google) in investments in IKT (information- och kommunikationsteknologi). The starting point for this project is that the areas of ICT and MIK are currently suffering from a lack of historical awareness, and independent research. The main actors are "enthusiasts" and external organizations, the knowledge interest is policy-oriented and short-sighted; conceptions of media tend to alternate between determinism (technology is the foundation for social change) and instrumentalism (technology "in itself" is neutral). In contrast, this project aims to study the impact of the media on the school's education of "media citizens" - subjects that are (media-) critically aware, (media-) historically conscious, and (media-) active, in terms of democratic participation. The intention is to study this process of adjustment historically and empirically, at the intersection of two research traditions: mediatization theory and curriculum theory. The project comprises three case studies that examine the development of curricula, teaching materials and teachers (in training) during the period 1962-2016.
Final report
Project aim and development
The aim of this project has been to study the historical impact of the media on the school’s training of what we refer to as “the media citizen” (social subjects whose critical abilities, historical awareness and inclination for democratic participation are assumed to be media-dependent). Hereby we have tried to problematize the otherwise often presentistic and instrumental view that dominate discussions around the relation between media and schooling; for example in association with concepts like digital competence and media and information literacy (MIL) The theoretical starting point for the project has been a combination of mediatization theory and curriculum theory. Questions regarding how the technologies, institutions and logics of the media affect schools has been linked to three empirical sub-studies covering: curricula (lgr 62-lgr 11), educational material, and teachers understanding of the media citizen of the future. The project got funding for three years but was prolonged (2015–2019). A lot of empirical work has been done but there has also been an emphasis on theoretical development. This can be noted in the forthcoming volume from the project (Forsman, Ericson), in articles (c.f Ericson, 2019; Forsman 2018a, 2019a) and in academic textbooks (Ericson, 2020; Forsman 2017, 2020). Forsler’s (2020 u.p.) dissertation should also be mentioned here since it developed in a parallel to the project, with the two project researchers as supervisors.
Main results and conclusions
One basic assumptions in this project has been that there is a historical continuum in how thoughts about media in school and media education has been expressed in curriculums, teaching materials, and teacher education. While the borders between media and education have become increasingly blurred, which is noticeable in imaginaries around the media citizen, and embedded in concepts like digital competence and MIL.The study has shown that there are connections between progressive pedagogics (Dewey et.al), and that the belief in new communication technologies has been significant, and that the connections between media education and new media technologies constant. Although there has been a duality in how media technologies on the one hand has been assimilated as educational technologies in the classroom, with promises of improvements, while at the same time being discussed in a negative sense in relation to the students leisure and peer groups etcetera. In this respect the curriculum and pedagogical materials basically has followed the dominating views of contemporary media debates and media theories regarding the risks and opportunities of “new media” and how media education can protect and empower the students in relation to this.
Empirically, the project has been based on three part-studies.
Part study 1 (curriculum: lgr 62, lgr 69, lgr 80, lpo 94, lgr 11). In this lgr 62 came to stand out as something of a key for the whole project, since the goals and guidelines here are so clearly adapted to societal change process, for which the influence of the media is understood to be central, the pedagogical ambitions are also connected to a presumption about a frequent use of audio visual appliance in the classroom. One particular “mediatization effect” can here be found in the instructions for how to set up and use the equipment for school-television in “the lecture room” (obscuration, antenna connection etc.) that was presented by The National Board of Education. These measures can also be linked to themes within contemporary media theory (Williams, Habermas) as well as to the pedagogical philosophy (Dewey that informed the modernization of the Swedish school (Ericson, 2019). Another central case in this parts study became lgr 11, as additions on digital media and digital competence were made around the same time as the project started. This lead to a conceptual analysis of ”digital competence” and a study of how this concept went from EU-documents, through Swedish digitalization committees, into lgr 11 (Forsman 2018a, 2019a). Here it can also be noted that concepts like digital competence has brought with them an increased instrumentalization and market adjustment in how media education is understood. Whereas lgr 69 and lgr 80 talked about the negative effects of “mass culture, and lpo 94 made connections between media education, Bildung and critical theory (Forsman 2019b; 2020 u.u.). In this ”critical thinking” has appeared to be a central concept for the understanding of the dynamic relation between media and schools (Forsman forthcoming).
Part study 2 (teaching material). Here the project has focused on external agents and how they have tried to cultivate the media citizen of the future to understand and use media in “the right way” (by making school papers, videos, webpages, or visiting the local newspaper etcetera). This part study contains an extensive collected and analyzed, not yet published material about “The Newspaper in school” which started as a close collaboration between the national board of education and the Swedish newspaper industry, in close connection to lgr 62 (Forsman, 2019a, Forsman 2020 u.u.). Another case that has been Apple och Google’s online-tutorials and courses for teachers, plus how digital platforms functions as a form of “hidden curriculum” in the socializstion of the media citizen as “prosumer” that will contribute to the algorithmic and commercial order of these new media institutions (Forsman, 2019b, 2019c).
Part study 3 (teachers) was meant to study how teachers relate to media society and the media citizen. Most of this part became realized in Forsler’s (2020 u.u.) dissertation "Enabling media. Infrastructures, imaginaries and cultural techniques in Swedish and Estonian visual arts education". The original plan for part study 3 was to focus on teachers in Swedish and Social Science, but Forsler in agreement with Forsman (main super visor) and Ericson (co-supervisor) instead did her investigation on how visual arts teachers use and understand media technologies and cultural techniques, and how they imagine the classroom of the future. Forsler also brought in methodological development through her use of future-workshop and video walks.
The project has also presented a theoretical development in relation to mediatization theory, by distancing itself from thoughts of media as content, transmission, tools. To instead focus on how media organize time, space, experience and communication. In this medium theory (McLuhan, Innis et.al.), media ecology (Postman, Mumford et.al.), and infrastructural perspectives (Durham Peters, Kittler, Parks) has been combined, and set in relation to some of the main assumptions within mediatization theory (for example regarding change). From Science and Technology Studies (STS) the concept ”sociotechnical imaginaries” was brought in to better understand how “new media” are conceptually linked to projections of the future. In terms of temporality and future imaginaries in relation to media and learning, the project has been fertilized by German historian Reinhart Kosselleck temporal hermenutics and conceptual analysis, in combination with Helge Jordheims work on synchronicity.
New research questions
Several new questions for continued research has grown through theoretical and analytical links between progressive education, mediatization, and an extended understanding of media; which make studies of classroom and learning platforms as “logistical media” possible. Other questions have been raised round more historical research on how “educational technologies” has been discussed in Swedish school research. From this three new research applications has been chiseled our: "The educational complex: a project on spaces of learning and media ecology" (Ericson, Forsman 2019 [denied]); "The myth of the mediated center: television and the educational complex 1962-1978" (Ericson, VR 2020); "Classroom of the future: from school-TV to VR (Forsman, VR 2020).
Dissemination and och partnerships
In 2015 the project invited a group of renowned international media literacy scholars to a workshop. This became a starting point for Forsman to establish within the international community of media literacy researchers (Forsman, 2019e, 2019f). While Ericson during 2018–2019 was a research fellow at the Centre for Advanced Studies at Oslo University, as part of an international research community that gathered around the theme “In Synch: The Mediation of Collective Times, Then and Now”. This venture was led by Helge Jordheim and included distinguished historians and STS-researchers, and media scholars like Geoffrey Bowker, John Durham Peters, Lucian Höllscher. The group will present their collaborative work in a forthcoming anthology on MIT-Press (incl. Ericson’s article ”On flow: times, tides and maelstroms”).
Presentations of the project has been made in more than 10 international media research conferences (ICA, ECREA, NORDMEDIA) and media literacy conferences (MES, IMLRS). The project has led to the development of a new course on the masters level (Critical media literacy), engagement in in research education, and contribution to the international history conference The Spaces of History (Södertörn University, 2018). A number of popular presentations has been held in conferences and symposiums about digitalization and the Swedish school, and Unesco’ meetings on the development of MIL.
The aim of this project has been to study the historical impact of the media on the school’s training of what we refer to as “the media citizen” (social subjects whose critical abilities, historical awareness and inclination for democratic participation are assumed to be media-dependent). Hereby we have tried to problematize the otherwise often presentistic and instrumental view that dominate discussions around the relation between media and schooling; for example in association with concepts like digital competence and media and information literacy (MIL) The theoretical starting point for the project has been a combination of mediatization theory and curriculum theory. Questions regarding how the technologies, institutions and logics of the media affect schools has been linked to three empirical sub-studies covering: curricula (lgr 62-lgr 11), educational material, and teachers understanding of the media citizen of the future. The project got funding for three years but was prolonged (2015–2019). A lot of empirical work has been done but there has also been an emphasis on theoretical development. This can be noted in the forthcoming volume from the project (Forsman, Ericson), in articles (c.f Ericson, 2019; Forsman 2018a, 2019a) and in academic textbooks (Ericson, 2020; Forsman 2017, 2020). Forsler’s (2020 u.p.) dissertation should also be mentioned here since it developed in a parallel to the project, with the two project researchers as supervisors.
Main results and conclusions
One basic assumptions in this project has been that there is a historical continuum in how thoughts about media in school and media education has been expressed in curriculums, teaching materials, and teacher education. While the borders between media and education have become increasingly blurred, which is noticeable in imaginaries around the media citizen, and embedded in concepts like digital competence and MIL.The study has shown that there are connections between progressive pedagogics (Dewey et.al), and that the belief in new communication technologies has been significant, and that the connections between media education and new media technologies constant. Although there has been a duality in how media technologies on the one hand has been assimilated as educational technologies in the classroom, with promises of improvements, while at the same time being discussed in a negative sense in relation to the students leisure and peer groups etcetera. In this respect the curriculum and pedagogical materials basically has followed the dominating views of contemporary media debates and media theories regarding the risks and opportunities of “new media” and how media education can protect and empower the students in relation to this.
Empirically, the project has been based on three part-studies.
Part study 1 (curriculum: lgr 62, lgr 69, lgr 80, lpo 94, lgr 11). In this lgr 62 came to stand out as something of a key for the whole project, since the goals and guidelines here are so clearly adapted to societal change process, for which the influence of the media is understood to be central, the pedagogical ambitions are also connected to a presumption about a frequent use of audio visual appliance in the classroom. One particular “mediatization effect” can here be found in the instructions for how to set up and use the equipment for school-television in “the lecture room” (obscuration, antenna connection etc.) that was presented by The National Board of Education. These measures can also be linked to themes within contemporary media theory (Williams, Habermas) as well as to the pedagogical philosophy (Dewey that informed the modernization of the Swedish school (Ericson, 2019). Another central case in this parts study became lgr 11, as additions on digital media and digital competence were made around the same time as the project started. This lead to a conceptual analysis of ”digital competence” and a study of how this concept went from EU-documents, through Swedish digitalization committees, into lgr 11 (Forsman 2018a, 2019a). Here it can also be noted that concepts like digital competence has brought with them an increased instrumentalization and market adjustment in how media education is understood. Whereas lgr 69 and lgr 80 talked about the negative effects of “mass culture, and lpo 94 made connections between media education, Bildung and critical theory (Forsman 2019b; 2020 u.u.). In this ”critical thinking” has appeared to be a central concept for the understanding of the dynamic relation between media and schools (Forsman forthcoming).
Part study 2 (teaching material). Here the project has focused on external agents and how they have tried to cultivate the media citizen of the future to understand and use media in “the right way” (by making school papers, videos, webpages, or visiting the local newspaper etcetera). This part study contains an extensive collected and analyzed, not yet published material about “The Newspaper in school” which started as a close collaboration between the national board of education and the Swedish newspaper industry, in close connection to lgr 62 (Forsman, 2019a, Forsman 2020 u.u.). Another case that has been Apple och Google’s online-tutorials and courses for teachers, plus how digital platforms functions as a form of “hidden curriculum” in the socializstion of the media citizen as “prosumer” that will contribute to the algorithmic and commercial order of these new media institutions (Forsman, 2019b, 2019c).
Part study 3 (teachers) was meant to study how teachers relate to media society and the media citizen. Most of this part became realized in Forsler’s (2020 u.u.) dissertation "Enabling media. Infrastructures, imaginaries and cultural techniques in Swedish and Estonian visual arts education". The original plan for part study 3 was to focus on teachers in Swedish and Social Science, but Forsler in agreement with Forsman (main super visor) and Ericson (co-supervisor) instead did her investigation on how visual arts teachers use and understand media technologies and cultural techniques, and how they imagine the classroom of the future. Forsler also brought in methodological development through her use of future-workshop and video walks.
The project has also presented a theoretical development in relation to mediatization theory, by distancing itself from thoughts of media as content, transmission, tools. To instead focus on how media organize time, space, experience and communication. In this medium theory (McLuhan, Innis et.al.), media ecology (Postman, Mumford et.al.), and infrastructural perspectives (Durham Peters, Kittler, Parks) has been combined, and set in relation to some of the main assumptions within mediatization theory (for example regarding change). From Science and Technology Studies (STS) the concept ”sociotechnical imaginaries” was brought in to better understand how “new media” are conceptually linked to projections of the future. In terms of temporality and future imaginaries in relation to media and learning, the project has been fertilized by German historian Reinhart Kosselleck temporal hermenutics and conceptual analysis, in combination with Helge Jordheims work on synchronicity.
New research questions
Several new questions for continued research has grown through theoretical and analytical links between progressive education, mediatization, and an extended understanding of media; which make studies of classroom and learning platforms as “logistical media” possible. Other questions have been raised round more historical research on how “educational technologies” has been discussed in Swedish school research. From this three new research applications has been chiseled our: "The educational complex: a project on spaces of learning and media ecology" (Ericson, Forsman 2019 [denied]); "The myth of the mediated center: television and the educational complex 1962-1978" (Ericson, VR 2020); "Classroom of the future: from school-TV to VR (Forsman, VR 2020).
Dissemination and och partnerships
In 2015 the project invited a group of renowned international media literacy scholars to a workshop. This became a starting point for Forsman to establish within the international community of media literacy researchers (Forsman, 2019e, 2019f). While Ericson during 2018–2019 was a research fellow at the Centre for Advanced Studies at Oslo University, as part of an international research community that gathered around the theme “In Synch: The Mediation of Collective Times, Then and Now”. This venture was led by Helge Jordheim and included distinguished historians and STS-researchers, and media scholars like Geoffrey Bowker, John Durham Peters, Lucian Höllscher. The group will present their collaborative work in a forthcoming anthology on MIT-Press (incl. Ericson’s article ”On flow: times, tides and maelstroms”).
Presentations of the project has been made in more than 10 international media research conferences (ICA, ECREA, NORDMEDIA) and media literacy conferences (MES, IMLRS). The project has led to the development of a new course on the masters level (Critical media literacy), engagement in in research education, and contribution to the international history conference The Spaces of History (Södertörn University, 2018). A number of popular presentations has been held in conferences and symposiums about digitalization and the Swedish school, and Unesco’ meetings on the development of MIL.