Media education in Poland - needs versus reality

Abstract

Media education should strive to shape an attitude of active creativity which ought to become a desired alternative for the passive way of experiencing the media. Therefore media education is a precious form of education, however, it is still imperfect and requires constructive changes. Meanwhile, in Polish education system there is no clear definition of media literacy, of what should be called media education and to what objectives that education should lead. The main goal of the research was the overview of the history of media education in Polish educational system and the practices for developing media education and media literacy in Poland, as well the teachers‘ attitudes towards media education and ways of developing media literacy among pupils. In order to collect empirical material, a survey was conducted among teachers from the Silesian Voivodship. The study involved 87 teachers. As well the analysis of content was used concerning strategic international and national documents, encompassing the points mentioned above. The best way to characterize the state of media education in Poland is to say that the policy makers, people who decide about its popularization in schools, prefer to be conservative about the whole concept.