Manitoba
This section comprises a curricular overview (below), as well as curriculum charts for Grades K-12 that feature media education outcomes in the Manitoba curriculum, with links to supporting MediaSmarts resources and lessons (sidebar).
Last updated March 2024
Curricular Overview
Talk about the 4 foundational skills areas: literacy and communication, problem solving, human relations, and technology https://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/cur/english_pr.html
In Manitoba, media study is integrated throughout the 5 general learning outcomes and 56 specific learning outcomes for each grade. The media education strands are strong, especially in viewing and representing texts.
The original K-Senior 1 (Grade 9) English Language Arts curriculum was distributed to Manitoba schools between 1996 and 2000. Recently, the department has completed a series of Foundation for Implementation documents to accompany the new curriculum. These documents provide teachers with suggestions for instruction, assessment and learning resources to support the implementation of curricular outcomes and standards. Apart from the 56 specific student learning outcomes for each grade, nothing is prescribed; selection of learning/teaching approaches and learning resources is left to individual schools.
The Senior 2 (Grade 10) Language Arts curriculum was mandated for system-wide use in 1998/99. Senior 3 (Grade 11) was implemented in 1999/2000 and Senior 4 (Grade 12) in 2000/2001. There are no prescribed stand-alone media education courses in Manitoba, but individual schools are free to submit their own media studies courses for approval by the department.
English Language Arts Grades K-12
Media literacy within the Manitoba English Language Arts curriculum is based on General Outcome 2 of the Western and Northern Canadian Protocol framework for English Language Arts:
- Students will listen, speak, read, write, view, and represent to comprehend and respond personally and critically to oral, literary, and media texts.
The following excerpt details how media education has been integrated into the Manitoba curriculum.
Students use a variety of strategies before, during, and after interacting with a variety of oral, literary and media texts. Before interacting with texts, they preview, ask questions and set purposes. While interacting with texts, they attend to the ideas being presented, make and confirm predictions and inferences, and monitor their understanding. After interacting with texts, students respond by reflecting, creating, analyzing, synthesizing and evaluating. Effective language learners adapt these strategies as they construct meaning from a variety of texts.
Making meaning of oral, literary, and media texts is fundamental to the English language arts. Through these texts, students experience a variety of situations, people, and cultures, and learn about themselves. Oral, literary, and media texts allow for multiple interpretations. Students respond personally to texts by relating them to their prior knowledge, feelings, and experiences, and to other texts. Through personal response, students explore and develop values and beliefs. They respond critically to texts by making interpretations and evaluating ideas, forms, and techniques.
Students enhance their comprehension of and response to oral, literary, and media texts through learning experiences in all the general outcomes. Exploratory talk and writing, for example, strengthen understanding and evaluation of texts. Students' appreciation of literary texts provides them with a range of topics and encourages them to experiment with a variety of forms in their own communication. Responding to oral, literary, and media texts provides students with new insights.
Students also enhance their response to texts by sharing and discussing with others. Competence in active listening, discussion, group participation and reflection enables students to interact with others in the learning community to increase understanding and self-awareness. While these skills and strategies are not always explicitly stated in the outcomes, they permeate all the general outcomes.
English Language Arts
Manitoba Curriculum Framework of Outcomes and Standards
Manitoba Education and Training