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The Media Team

Curriculum Leader

Miss V Proud - vproud@theacademy.me

Teachers of Media

  • Mrs L Hallam
  • Mrs R Leach

Curriculum intent

COGNITION CURRICULUM

Reciprocation- Students are set group tasks to complete including media production work. This requires group participation at all stages of the production process, team planning, meeting, production and postproduction. Students regularly participate in paired and group discussions and peer assess each others work.

Resilience - Student's use PLCs through their unit of work to reflect where they are currently and where they aim to be. Following every assessment students re draft their work to develop it following the SIR marking.

Resourcefulness - Students are explicitly taught the Close Study Products (CSPs) which all require an element of wider social, historical and cultural context. We expect students to experience a wide range of media products outside of school, building their knowledge of media texts which they can draw on throughout their study. Students are encouraged to explore creative ways to develop their production work. Students are regularly set independent research tasks and project work where they are  build on their knowledge independently.

Reflectiveness - Students use their PLCs, written and verbal feedback and their SIR marking to review and develop their learning and build on it.

Recall - We have implemented retrieval practice explicitly into some of our lessons with starter activities to include ‘cops and robbers’, ’10 question quiz, challenge grids.

In year 9 students create Media dictionaries which are carried through as a tool to build terminology- they are tested regularly on terminology.

We have developed our teaching of revision skills in years 10 and 11 with revision techniques explicitly taught, revision timetables and revision resources provided and taught.

Students in year 10 are provided with crib sheets and knowledge organisers which as used as a revision resource through to year 11. The crib sheets are built on throughout the two years to encourage students to remember the basic content and use it to build on.

Culture Curriculum

The AQA Media Studies GCSE requires students to study a broad range of Media products from all nine media forms. The nature of the course encourages students to develop their cultural capital. The products the students engage with all possess cultural, social and historical significance in terms of critical acclaim and/or audience, are from different historical periods, are intended for different audiences, demonstrate emerging, future developments of the media and are not necessarily the type of products which students would normally engage with. (AQA Specification)

Reading – Students are encouraged to read around the CSPs to develop their wider contextual knowledge. The Newspaper and magazine CSPs require students to develop their reading skills and to engage in extended reading activities. Revision guides are made available to all students and reading from these is used in conjunction with the teaching of the course. We encourage reading and literacy through our displays, including the Watched the film, have you read the book? display. A media reading list (books available via  the library) are referred to in lessons and recommended to students.

Enrichment –The Media course is enriched with a variety of trips:

Year Group

Trip Destination

Related Topic/ Unit

Year 9

Cinema Trip

 Film

Year 10

Harry Potter Studio

NEA production, Film, TV industry, Careers

Years 11

BFI

AQA GCSE Revision, Careers

Year 12

Harry Potter, NFTS

Careers, production

Year 13

Pinewood,

Careers, Unit 2, production units

Visitors – We invite a cinematographer in to discuss film and television production to the year 9 students. In Year 12 and 13 we invite a marketing officer into the school to support students with their Unit 2 and Unit 6 work. Speakers for Schools virtual guest speakers speak to a range of year groups on a range of Media topics.

Extracurricular – APR (Academic Public Relations) Club is a student led whole school marketing club. The 6th form Media students lead younger students, training them on elements of production in order to produce marketing materials for teachers around the school.

Into Film Club is our KS4 and 5 film club where students have the opportunity to view and review a wide range of films they would not necessarily view in their own time.

Character Education – Both the BTEC and the GCSE courses support our school’s commitment to implementing the British values. We study a diverse range of texts which represent our community. The courses allow for a range od debates and discussion including issues of the effects of media on audiences, ideology, representation and more. We encourage healthy debate and discussion and create a safe environment for students to share their views.  

Core Curriculum

A Broad and ambitious curriculum- The curriculum we offer goes beyond the requirements of the exam board. We provide a curriculum which will develop student's Media literacy skills and empower them to become critically engaged with the media they consume long after they have left AVA and completed their exams. We provide the skills they need to decode the messages in the media, we expose students to a broad range of media products, issues and debates that they will draw on throughout their further studies and their lives. 

Our teaching is grounded in high expectations, so our learners achieve exceptionally well- The curriculum is designed to show progression from KS3 to KS5 allowing students to build on skills and knowledge allowing them to achieve. The teachers in the department demonstrate high expectations in their teaching- demonstrated in their lesson observations.

Close all the gaps between the performance of different groups of learners- The curriculum is designed with students of different abilities at all stages. The lessons are all differentiated using the AVA taxonomy to allow for progression regardless of the individual’s starting point. We adapt the teaching and the delivery of the teaching following PAM meetings to ensure we are constantly looking for ways to engage the groups of learners who are performing less well. We adapt the curriculum in line with the exam board regularly.

Developing character so they are resilient, aspirational and respectful and have excellent attitude to learning. We have an excellent enrichment opportunity available in the department with clubs and trips on offer to all students in the department. We have high expectations in classrooms, and work hard to develop respectful relationships with the students. Some of the issues and debates discussed in the curriculum require some sensitivity and we set the expectation so that the classroom is a safe and respectful space where students are able to develop their character and learn the appropriate responses to sensitive topics. Success is celebrated with postcards and phone calls home, rewards and achievement points are often rewarded to students to promote aspiration and the 6th form groups regularly attend and lead clubs and some lessons as role models to the younger years.

Inspire attendance- We design the curriculum so it is contemporary, exciting and engaging to encourage students to participate. We ensure that the curriculum covers topics and debates that affect the students directly (eg BLM, feminist issues, media effects and video game violence etc), we discuss people and events that the students are familiar with. We also offer a range of exciting trips and opportunities to encourage attendance.

Careers

The Media careers logo appears on all lesson slides throughout the curriculum where careers is discussed, or a careers activity is incorporated. For example - Year 9.

Into Film – We use this resource to support teaching of film careers in year 10, 11, 12, 13. 

Year Group

Career Opportunity

Related Topic/ Unit

Year 9

Write a job avert for a directors job

Magazine Journalism task

Production tasks

Film- Hugo

Print Media

NEA

Year 10

Harry Potter Studio Trip

Influencer career tasks

Industry structures

NEA production, Film, TV industry, Careers

Online participatory media

Film

Years 11

BFI Trip- various guest speakers from industry

Fleet street journalism

BAME Careers

AQA GCSE Revision, Careers

Newspapers

Represent advertising

Year 12

Harry Potter Trip,

NFTS Trip

Advertising and Marketing visit from Simon Lloyd

Careers, production,

Unit 6,

Year 13

Pinewood Trip,

Speakers for schools- regular virtual careers talks.

Creating a range of career resources including CV, show reel, social media

Careers, all production units

Unit 2,

All units

Unit 2

 

 


Useful Links

http://www.aqa.org.uk/

http://mediaknowall.com/blog/

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