In Korea, media education has a history of 30 years, and is expanding its area across various ages and classes recently. And the lifelong education sector is also showing increasing attention to the media education for all ages. However, there are few academic efforts that keep step with this situation. In this respect, this thesis aims to draw some of the implications for setting the direction of media education for each phase of one's lifetime by performing an qualitative analysis of the experiences and perceptions of the participants in media education.
First of all, I reviewed previous studies on the learning tasks and the characteristics of media education for each phase of life. And then, I analyzed the stories of the participants in media education about their experience and perceptions by adopting narrative analysis method. I selected two participants for each phase of life, and performed semi-structured interviews with them. Their stories went through contents analysis afterwards. The phases of life for this study are childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle adulthood, late adulthood.
The participants' experiences of media education for each phase of life are as follows.
Media education in childhood was experienced as 'holding photo exhibitions and cultural activities', 'showing one's feelings about the changes in the neighborhood', 'going through long and boring meetings', 'helpful for school studies ', 'starting to take pictures everyday'. Media education in adolescence was experienced as 'encountering media education amid the repressive study culture', 'expressing and manifesting oneself', 'positive thinking', 'having a conversation with one's family', 'seeing oneself', 'going on to universities'. Media education in early adulthood was experienced as 'meeting different people with common interests', 'expanding one's thoughts and transforming one's idea into action', 'starting to think about different ideas and interests', 'making plans for media related activities after the end of media education', 'being acquainted with unsophisticated videos'. Media education in middle adulthood was experienced as 'having an self-awareness', 'recovering confidence by having a new experience', 'change of perspective', 'having an understanding of community and a communicating space', 'moving away from video production and practicing everyday reading'. Media education in late adulthood was experienced as 'refreshment in life', 'standing in front of others and the confidence it gives', 'children's attention', 'health', 'talent and leisure'.
Based on these experiences, the participants in media education for each phase of life perceived media education as follows.
In childhood, media education was perceived as 'fun', 'different feelings', 'express emotion'. In adolescence, it was perceived as 'fun', 'energy that fills emptiness', 'expectation of a new encounter', 'something that gives power to life', 'an everyday practice'. In early adulthood, it was perceived as 'having the ability to make use of media', 'appealing and influential', 'channel of communication', 'a base for action', 'reaching out for more people', 'being aware of invisible problems'. In middle adulthood, it was perceived as 'advantages of media', 'logical and future oriented cultural education', 'education to change and enhance one's perspective and expressivity', 'the need to take into account of children's age and having comfortable mind', 'a space for communication'. In late adulthood, it was perceived as 'learning through words', 'media equals moving image', 'a time when one reveals one's inner self as well as a time of free leisure', 'need to consider English and the size of letters', 'appropriate period for media education'.
In this way, we can see the major characteristics of participants' perceptions of media education in each phase. In childhood, media education was seen as a 'fun, interesting' class, while in adolescence, it was seen as 'an energy of life', or 'power to live on'. In early adulthood, it was perceived as communicating with the society and the community with common interests as well as 'a base for action'. In middle adulthood, it was viewed as 'a space for communication', while in late adulthood, it was seen as 'a time of free leisure and a time when one reveals one's inner self'.
We can make a connection between the participants' perceptions and their experiences. Media education is perceived as 'fun' in childhood because it is experienced through 'direct handling of media', whereas it becomes an 'energy' of life in adolescence because it is a useful experience for going to the related universities of one's choice. In early adulthood, it is perceived as communicating with other people with similar interests and transforming one's idea into action because it is experienced as 'forming community consciousness'. In middle adulthood, it is regarded as 'a communicating space with other people' because it is experienced as a moment of 'recovering confidence' by expressing one's thoughts using media facilities. In late adulthood, it is perceived as "free leisure and expression of one's inner self', resulting from the experience of 'refreshment of life'. In order words, the participants' perception of media education varies according to their experiences in each phase of life.
If we compare these findings with the previous studies on learning tasks and the characteristics of media education in each phase of life, we can draw some of the implications for setting the direction of media education for each phase of life.
That is, for childhood, we can perform a 'fun and interesting' media education through 'direct handling of media', whereas media education for adolescence can be performed as an energy of life and a preparatory process for furthering one's education. For early adulthood, we can perform media education that forms community consciousness and a base for action, while for middle adulthood, we can perform media education as a communicating space for recovering confidence. Media education for late adulthood can be performed as a free leisure activity and a time when one can reveal one's inner side through a refreshment of life.