Perceptions of Turkish Academicians on Media Literacy Assessment in Higher Education in Turkey

Abstract

This descriptive study investigates Turkish academicians' perceptions of the media literacy outcomes, assessment, and challenges of media literacy education, and their recommendations to overcome these challenges in higher education. Data were collected from 41 Turkish academicians working at Turkish universities from seven geographic regions. Data were collected via the "Media Literacy Assessment Questionnaire" which was developed by Schilder (2014). Participants were academicians with subject-area specialisation in English Language Teaching, Computer Education and Instructional Technology in the education faculty, and academicians with subject-area specialisation in the departments of communication faculty as these academicians were interested in media and technology and media literacy education. Results of the study reveal that formative assessment was a prominent assessment method; however, most assessment methods that the academicians used were also identified as time-consuming or complex to develop. Results also show that academicians were unsure about how to interpret students' responses to assess their media literacy and identified teachers' insufficient training as a challenge in assessing outcomes. Based on the data results obtained from this study, specifying learning outcomes beforehand shouldn't be accomplished by the force of administration, but should be determined by the consensus among all parties in the field. Results also reveal that critical literacy and pedagogy should be taken into account in media literacy education so that learners can become critically autonomous citizens in this globalised world. Keywords: Media literacy, Media literacy education, Assessment, Critical pedagogy, Higher education.