2009 Volume 15 Issue 2 Pages 15-21
This paper argues that a video game creation provides a valuable tool for understanding how students might contest prevailing hegemonic consumption culture in media education. The effects of a video game creation is explained in Queensland Government Education (QLD) media education curriculum. It suggests an alternative to 'informatization of school education' by actively using computers and the Internet, which continue to motivate many computer educators, despite serious questions being asked about their effectiveness. The paper draws on data collected from a unit of teaching material work about video games, completed by pre-service teacher training students in a university computer science education course. It argues that many media -related activities fail to elicit genuinely 'critical' responses because they are complicit in the regulation of hegemonic verbal information discourse. It suggests that teachers are more likely to create the potential for variation in their students' media literacy work if activities are for sustainability and avoid placing emphasis on discourse of excellence and competition of knowledge.
