Introduction

Abstract

The British Film Institute report, ‘Primary Media Education: Curriculum Statement’, ‘proposed six areas of knowledge and understanding as the basis for … curriculum development’ (Barker, 1991, p. 5):

WHO is communicating, and why? WHAT TYPE of text is it? HOW is it produced? HOW do we know what it means? WHO receives it, and what sense do they make of it? HOW does it PRESENT its subject?

(Ibid., p. 6)

In course planning, ‘common sense’ often leads to teaching about one medium at a time … placing emphasis solely on the characteristics of only one set of practices … [which] ignores the fact that all individuals experience media as a set of interrelated and interacting systems.

(Barker, 1991, p. 5)