Introduction to the Historical Past: Informal Educational Media Practices in Modern Russia

Abstract

Relevance of research. The article discusses the situation in the Russian education system in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic followed by a restraint mode. This is the time of active implementation of digital technologies in education and increased importance of media. The relevance of the article is associated with the need to structure media practices, that proved a good potential during that period, and a theoretical analysis of their place in the education system. The author identifies for the analysis aspects related to the problem of introducing children and youth to the historical traditions in the new social and cultural context. Research objective — To summarise a number of media practices updated during the pandemic and associated with introducing pupils to the historical past. Research methodology and methods. The research is based on an interdisciplinary methodology that allows integrating the achievements of various social sciences and humanities. The cluster analysis and content analysis of electronic information, outreach and educational resources were used as private methods. To identify promising educational trends, the materials of informal expert interviews were analysed. Research novelty. The article presents a conceptual and categorical grid ‘media environment — media activity — media practice’, which is used to describe informal educational media practices. The author analyses three groups of media activities: 1) focused on expanding the educational field for schoolchildren (case The 75th Anniversary of the Great Victory), 2) offering new forms of family leisure (case ‘Then an inventor appeared…’) and 3) creating new professional activity opportunities for teachers (case ‘Urals during the Great Patriotic War’: scientific and methodological work in the context of digitalisation’). As a result of the research, it is concluded that the described informal educational media practices, despite their specific content (Russian patriotic discourse), can be considered as versatile and promising: the use of new teaching and personal development formats can expand the range of instructional tools in both formal and non-formal education.