Abstract
Media education processes are complex networked phenomena which, like education in general, not only depend on determinants and intervening variables, but are also the product of the free self-activity of the educating individual. This has normative consequences for the scientific-theoretical concept of educational research and practice. Qualitative as well as quantitative research practice are faced with the problem of shaping this practice in recognition of the researching and researched subject and at the same time not only not hindering the normative principle of educational promotion, but promoting it in the research process. Referring to Pierre Bourdieu, Grounded Theory and Action Research, which has long been forgotten, intervention and research are characterised as the interlinked aspects of an educational network in which the various educational and research partners jointly shape media education. The paper outlines such a research paradigm, referred to here as Grounded Practice, using the example of a multi-year research and intervention project in which the media literacy of children and educators was surveyed, developed and metacognitively reflected upon on the basis of such an educational network of municipality, university, day-care centres and families with researchers, educators, students, children and parents.
