Pedagogical strategies for the development of visual storytelling and multimedia design in the training of media communication specialists

Abstract

The article is devoted to the substantiation and empirical verification of an integrated pedagogical model aimed at developing comprehensive competencies in the field of visual storytelling and multimedia design among students majoring in Media Communications and Journalism , in the context of the dominance of visual content in the digital environment and the persistent gap between academic training and industry requirements. The purpose of the study is to identify the effectiveness of complex pedagogical strategies combining project-based and problem-based learning, interdisciplinary workshops, and the involvement of media industry representatives, in comparison with the traditional separate model of studying journalism, design, and technological disciplines. The study was conducted in 2021-2023 at three Russian universities; the quasi-experiment involved 184 third- and fourth-year students divided into a control group (n=91), trained under the standard program, and an experimental group (n=93), for which a one-year cross-cutting multimedia project was implemented using professional software (Adobe Creative Cloud, Figma, Tilda, etc.), master classes by industry experts, and team-based project work. The assessment included pre- and post-testing in four competency blocks, expert analysis of final projects on a 10-point scale, and statistical processing of results using the Mann–Whitney U test and Pearson correlation analysis (p<0.05). It was established that, given the initial homogeneity of the groups, the growth of competencies in the experimental group significantly exceeded that of the control group: for example, the growth of storytelling skills reached 51.8% compared to 15,3%, and project management skills increased by 47,5% compared to 14,9%; expert evaluations of concept originality, visual aesthetics, and narrative integrity in the experimental group were consistently higher and characterized by lower variance. The identified very strong correlation (r=0.819) between software proficiency and narrative quality in the experimental group (with a weak correlation in the control group) indicates the formation of a synergistic structure of competencies. The discussion of the results allows the conclusion that the effectiveness of the integrated storytelling-oriented model has been proven, and highlights the necessity of its implementation in media communication educational programs to bridge the gap between university training and the demands of the modern media industry.