The term “media education” is still a matter of heated debate in Russia today. Mass media experts understand media education mostly as professional training (including early professional development) for future journalists, TV and cinema directors, cameramen, etc. With the advent of multimedia computer technologies, laymen now tend to believe that media education means IT in education. Given the fact that the term has originated in the educational environment, both interpretations need to be clarified. For teachers, media education means primarily texts from mass media offered to students to read, analyze, and produce their own ‘media-texts’. In this situation the developmental and formative functions of media education come first: media education serves both as a tool to study this area of knowledge and a way to shape students’ overall information culture – mostly critical thinking and skills to handle information. As for media education technologies, they have an applied nature and help to consolidate studying of various school subjects and courses into an integrated process of learning because the main goal of media education is to develop overall information skills, information culture, ethics and aesthetics of communication in the world of mass communications.