This document outlines the curriculum for a Year 9 media studies foundation year. The goals are to build students' media literacy skills, vocabulary, and practical skills in a low-stakes environment. It will also help students explore different media career paths and industries. The curriculum covers topics like media language, genres, representation, audiences, industries, and includes a production challenge. It aims to address weaknesses in terminology, analyzing unseen texts, industry knowledge, and practical skills to better prepare students for exams in later years.

1. Y9 MS FOUNDATION YEAR
Planting seeds for future success

2. Rationale:
Builds a foundation of skills and knowledge meaning the learning curve when approaching exam texts is mitigated.
Allows for exploration of the media as a whole without being penned in by exam criteria: a more holistic media
education.
Allows for the structured integration of vocabulary building exercises and retrieval practice to reduce exam revision
pressure and improve quality of written response.
Encourages regular practical tasks, essential ton build a skillset for approaching coursework tasks in later years.
Allows for exploration of the plethora of careers available in the media industries, not necessarily covered in the GCSE/
A Level.
Current key weaknesses are terminology usage, unseen text resilience, knowledge of industries and practical skills.
This year addresses all of those in a low stakes environment with a range of contemporary and familiar texts, to then
build confidence for exam texts.
Potentially allows students to start to consider the paths at A Level that may interest them: Photography, English,
Media, Film, Music, Drama, Graphic Design, Psychology or a combination of these.

3. Hot off the Press: Media
Language Form and
Context
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6
SEMIOTICS
Y9 MS FOUNDATION YEAR
Planting seeds for future success
Fade in: AV Media
Language, Form and
Context
White, Middle Class,
Male: Issues in
Representation
Changing Relationships:
Audience and New
Media
Empires of
Entertainment: Media
Industries
Grassroots Media:
Production Challenge
GENRE GENDER CATEGORISING PROCESSES AD CAMPAIGN
COLOUR/GRAPHICS
MIS EN SCENE
FRAMING
CHARACTER
PLOT
SOUND
ETHNICITY
AGE
CLASS MEDIA EFFECTS
CONTROVERSY
TALKING BACK FRANCHISES
REGULATION
THE FUTURE
MUSIC VIDEO
FILM
JOURNALISM
3 4 5

4. SEMIOTICS
COLOUR/GRAPHICS
MISE EN SCENE
FRAMING
HOT OFF THE PRESS
Print media language, form and context
• How do we read the media?
• Encoding, decoding and polysemic products
• Naturalisation and the impact of coded media
• Colour significance and symbolism
• Colour palettes
• Typography and graphic design
• Lighting
• Environment
• Studio/set/location
• Angles
• Shots
• In context

5. GENRE
CHARACTER
PLOT
SOUND
FADE IN:
AV media language, form and context
• What is genre?
• Why is it important?
• Key indicators of genre and iconic genre films
• Character archetypes
• Why is it important?
• Character and characterisation
• Plot structures
• Feature film vs the short: Pixar
• New wave narrative
• Diegetic and non-diegetic sound
• Sound as a narrative and characterisation device
• Iconic soundtracks

6. P;[‘’
GENDER
ETHNICITY
AGE
CLASS
MIDDLE CLASS, WHITE, MALE:
Issues in Representation
• Male gaze
• Female gaze
• Addressing the issue: Purl
• Post-colonialism
• ‘Othering’
• Hollywood today
• Words hurt: age and advertising terminology
• Age in AV media
• Impact of age bias
• What is class?
• Downton vs Brassic: class on film
• Impact of class representation

7. CATEGORISING
TALKING BACK
CONTROVERSY
MEDIA EFFECTS
CHANGING RELATIONSHIPS:
Audience and New Media
• Why categorise audience?
• Psychographic profiling
• Impact on media
• Fandom
• Rise of the prosumer - and what this means for media industries
• Case studies
• Ad campaigns
• Audience power for good and evil
• When things go too far
• Violent video games
• Cultivation - how much does the media influence our views on the world?
• Positive effects

8. PROCESSES
FRANCHISES/
CAMPAIGNS
REGULATION
THE FUTURE
EMPIRES OF ENTERTAINMENT:
Media Industries
• Production, distribution and exhibition
• Commodification of creativity
• Print campaigns: Dior
• AV franchise: MCU
• Gaming franchise: Mario
• PSB Charter
• Ofcom, PEGI and the GRA, BBFC
• Digital platforming
• Asynchronous consumption
• VR

9. AD CAMPAIGN
MUSIC VIDEO
JOURNALISM
FILM
GRASSROOTS:
Production challenge and festival
• Set briefs to be decided and proposals submitted
• AV, print or both
• Set briefs to be decided and proposals submitted
• Extract of a music video - can be an established artist but must differ creatively
• Written report and/or piece to camera
• News journalism, special report or critiquing
• Short film, trailer or screenplay
• Can be a fan fiction