London, United Kingdom

Educational Representations Through the Media

This module provides a general introduction to educational studies through the use of media. Media understood here includes both fictional (e.g. film and literature) and non-fictional sources (e.g. TV shows and documentaries). The module will consider how various educational concepts are represented through media, including (but not limited to) teacher-student relationships and identities, educational curricula, schooling, the function of academic institutions, as well as broader understandings of what constitutes education itself.

Through engaging with selected sources, questions around what education is and how education is represented will be considered. Students will consider the value of both fictional and non-fictional sources when thinking, researching, and writing about education, as tools for both entertainment and insight. This will further raise questions around performativity and reliability in education and educational research, the relationship between representation and reality, and the ways in which understandings of reality are affected by such images more broadly.

Course leader

Dr Rowena Azada-Palacios

Target group

This is a level one module (equivalent to first year undergraduate). Students must have completed one year of undergraduate study. No prior subject knowledge is required for this module, but students are expected to have a keen interest in the area.

Course aim

Upon successful completion of this module, students will:

Be able to critically analyse the ways in which education is represented in both fictional and nonfictional media.
Be able to recognise, describe, and expound upon key concepts in the study of education, including (but not limited to) the teacher-student relationship, teacher and learner identities, and the nature and purpose of schooling and of academic institutions, through the critical use of both written and visual forms of media.
Develop skills in critical analysis and writing in relation to the study of media and its relationship to education. This will also be developed through their engagement with secondary literature.
Understand the relationship between representations of education in both fictional and non-fictional sources and in educational policy and practice.
Have critically reflected on their own understanding of education and the role of media in relation to this.

Credits info

7.5 EC
7.5 ECTS, 4 US, 15 UCL

Fee info

GBP 2350: There is a built-in tuition fee discount for students studying for 6 weeks (2 modules).
GBP : Students have the option of living in UCL accommodation, close to campus in vibrant central London.