This project represents an attempt to examine and evaluate the educational impact of media studies on the formative years of schooling. Some of the skills, strategies and procedures students must adopt in engaging with this subject are examined in assessing the possible role it can play in the cognitive and creative development of primary aged students. Chapter One provides an overview of current debates concerning the social, cultural and psychological implications of different media. This discussion explores in particular the cognitively-relevant characteristics of visual media and their growing significance as conveyors of meaning within the cultural domain. The centrality of the image within modern communication systems has prompted many theorists and educationalists to consider the possibilities for broader models of discourse which would inform our educational provisions from the earliest levels. This discussion is taken up again in Chapter Two where some of the initiatives and experiments in media studies programmes from neighbouring European countries are examined. These programmes, while disparate, share a common emphasis on language in its composite sense (i.e. as composed of words, images and sounds) and stress the need to forge links between the school experience and subcultural experiences of young children. Chapter Three addresses current theories of child development and learning exploring possible continuities and connections between the more recent theories and the pedagogical fundamentals of media studies classes. Of particular relevance in this discussion are emerging perspectives which question many of the existing principles and assumptions which underly our educational provisions at this level. Current policy and actual classroom practice in the Irish context are also examined in attempting to determine both the theoretical and practical implications of introducing media studies onto the primary curriculum. Chapters Four and Five consist of a case study which attempts to test and evaluate some of the developing assumptions concerning the cognitive, creative and analytical skills which are enabled through a media pedagogy. Data recorded during a series of media studies classes provides a resource from which to generate inferences and interpretations of the kinds of learning strategies and intellectual skills students appear to be adopting.