The paper reports on a teaching innovation applied in the course Media Studio 2 at the Department of Journalism at Comenius University in Bratislava. Following contribution aims to address three takeaways: information about ways and possibilities of active learning in journalism education, limits of implemented innovations in the online learning environment and discussion on opportunities for collaboration with media professionals in journalism education.
The primary aim of the innovation focused on the concept of constructive alignment and active learning methods in order to achieve the expected learning outcomes of the course, a development of the students’ skills in the area of conducting interviews. Therefore is the course practical and focuses on building journalistic skills which are needed as in print as in online media formats. Media Studio 2 is designed for first-year bachelor students and currently there are 16 students enrolled in this course.
The main challenge which leads me to apply the teaching innovation is connecting theory and practice in terms of conducting interviews. I’ve implemented two main innovations in my teaching, firstly, I have changed the way of collaboration with Slovak journalists. Students meet with journalists twice a semester and discuss their own interviews on an individual level. I consider this way of collaboration as very important and needed, whereas I suppose that individual feedback from professionals will contribute to better quality interviews. Secondly, I’ve applied Kahoot that is created by students on weekly basis, in order to motivate students to follow news on weekly basis, which is important and inevitable for a future journalist and to help them identify the topics for the interviews and assess who is a relevant interviewee in the certain topic. In my research, I will examine if the innovations and methods I have applied contributed to connecting theory and practice in terms of conducting interviews. I will collect qualitative and quantitative data which will help me to indicate if the innovation achieved its goals.
Key words: journalism, teaching, innovation, Kahoot, constructive alignment, collaboration
