School Based Media Education: Sharing of Experiences and Lessons Learned from Indonesia

Authors: Hendriyani, Nina Mutmainnah, Billy Sarwono - Atmonobudi.
Title: School Based Media Education: Sharing of Experiences and Lessons Learned from Indonesia

The atmosphere of democracy that started in Indonesia since 1998 has brought tremendous change in Indonesia’s media landscape. It grows from one (government owned) TV station to 11 stations that broadcast nationally and more than 200 local/community TV stations.
The high increasing of media penetration which reached urban and rural areas in Indonesia has become huge problems among children and youth. Children spend more time in front of TV than at school per year. They spend more than 7 hours for using media every day (TV, video games, internet, book, etc). The content of the media is full with violence; the physical or psychological violence is also found in most cartoon programs, the programs that are very closely associated with children. Many scholars have conducted researches on the effects of media violence to children. They've found a consistent and strong association between media violence and aggressive behaviour, desensitization to violence, fear, depression, nightmares, and sleep disturbance.
Concerning about the potential negative effect of media among children and youth, Yayasan Pengembangan Media Anak (Children Media Development Foundation) has been conducting media education for elementary schools’ teachers since 2004, with support from UNICEF Indonesia. The objective of the program is to promote media literacy among the teachers, which will be shared with their students. Media literacy is the ability to access, analyze, evaluate media content, and communicate message through certain media.
Through this paper, we would like to share our experiences and lessons learned from the media education program in Jakarta, Central Java and East Java. The program should be integrated into the school curricula and adjusted to the local needs of teachers and their students. It also needs support from local community, such as local authority and elderly, to create new culture of consuming media in a healthy way.
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Contact
Hendriyani
Affiliation: Department of Communication Science, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Universitas Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia.
Email: hendriyani@centrin.net.id or hendriyani@gmail.com


Biodata
The authors are teaching staff in Department of Communication Science, Universitas Indonesia. They are active in Children’s Media Development Foundation as researcher, facilitator of trainings and editor of media guide for parents. Armando’s focus of study is sociology communications as well as media and children; while Hendriyani’s focus is on children and audio-visual media. Sarwono’s focuses on media and special audiences, including media and gender.

The author is teaching staff in Department of Media Studies, Universitas Indonesia. She is a member of MediaClimate Working Groups, and she is active in Children’s Media Development Foundation as researcher, facilitator of trainings and editor of media guide for parents. Her focuses of studies is on media & gender, and also climate change issues.

detail :email : billysarwono@gmail.com