TEACHERS
TALK MEDIA LITERACY
Anyone
who has ever tried to bring an innovation to a school
site or whole system, has encountered the phrase, "how
are we going to do this, in addition to everything
else we are already doing."? With that in mind, we
wanted to see how classroom teachers, media
specialists and technology coordinators respond to
media literacy when they return to school from some
initial training. The following represent some of the
comments from North Carolina teachers.
Case Study #1 - Wanda
Case
Study #1 - Wanda It was amazing! As I started reviewing
the Social
Studies Standard Course of Study
Framework
developed by the State
Board of education North Carolina Department of Public
Instruction for the public schools of North Carolina, I
found that it could have been called the Media Literacy
Standard Course of Study. One of the first essential questions
to be asked of students in the content overview section
addressing the Role of Disciplines in the K-12 Social
Studies Curriculum is, "What can we learn from the
past about how new
technologies result in broader unanticipated social change?
"What a wonderful time to bring in an African folk tale and
discuss with the children how information in our society is
presented to us differently today than it was in the past. I
would also present the Jack Tales of our own
Appalachian Mountain culture and use a Venn diagram to graph
the differences in the past and modern day
technologies. Listed under the Rationale for Social
Studies in the School Curriculum International Perspective
is the statement: "All our technological advances make the
world an even smaller place, in which
the power of the individual for good or
evil is immensely increased." Students must be taught the
responsibilities of concerned citizens. They must be aware
of the ways in which producers of television programs and
advertisements are presenting their products and directly
targeting certain gender, age or interest groups with
products and productions. They need to know how quickly
information is now passed from one source to another and how
technology has changed the way people live. Another area
related to media technology is the Rights and
Responsibilities section. It reads, "Our notion of literacy
must extend beyond fundamentals as traditionally conceived."
Public schools have a responsibility to inform students of
their rights and liberties and should give students a civic
education and a body of knowledge to access, analyze,
evaluate, and communicate ideas and information. Students
need to feel empowered before they will be able to make
decisions for themselves in order to avoid negative peer
pressure and corrupt advertisers. Cultural Transmission in
the Social Studies Curriculum expresses to educators that,
"As the nation has grown, become less isolated, become more
pluralistic and has been affected by advancing technology,
civic education has become more complex." What a wonderful
chance to discuss with students how certain cultures are
represented in the media. They should become aware of how the
media stereotype different social groups and how people's
emotions are affected by these stereotypes. Teenagers are
often portrayed as being rude, loud, and uncaring, in
newspapers and on television. In order to understand the
issue better, students could research and present their
findings about media stereotypes. Today it is possible to know more
about our world faster and easier than ever before. It is
the task of social studies education to make sense of this
changing knowledge of our world by placing it in
perspective. Students must be encouraged to get the whole
picture before making judgments on issues. They must be told
how news broadcasts use certain angles and methods to
present images the way they want them to
appear. When I took a group of fifth graders
to Washington D.C., they were able to discover a certain
trick the media use to present the news. A street vendor had
set a camera in front of a backdrop of the president,
allowing anyone to appear to be shaking hand with a world
leader. Many of my students did this and took pictures home
to their parents. Through this experience, my students
became aware of how news reporters could appear to be
standing in prominent places when they actually were in
studios. The curriculum states, "Since we
cannot predict what specific knowledge and behavior will be
demanded in the future, we must concentrate on educating
citizens who will be able to solve problems that cannot
presently be foreseen. Tomorrow's citizens must effectively
analyze information, resolve problems, and make informed
choices. Since the future is uncertain, it is necessary to
prepare students to be scholarly, exercise leadership, and
support democratic ideals." I believe in the order to
accomplish these tasks in our global society, students must
learn to be reflective and realize that what has happened in
the their past affects how they view issues today. Also,
students must learn to look at problems and events from the
viewpoints of others and know that others have had different
experiences. Different people may interrupt similar
situation differently because of their
backgrounds. The Framework Goals declare, "A
balanced and effective K-12 social studies program prepares
students to be active, informed, and responsible citizens."
How can students increase their awareness of the world, the
nation, or their states unless they are media literate? We
have more information than ever at our fingertips, but
unless it can be put into perspective, it will be useless to
the students. Media must be questioned and analyzed for
meaning before students will ever be informed and responsive
citizens. Never before in history have children had so many
tools available to them. Under the section "Changing Nature of
Knowledge," the curriculum informs us that, "Technology
provides increasingly easy access to databases that are
cross-disciplinary and multidisciplinary, as well as to
scholarly works." By knowing where and how to access
information children will be able to gather data faster than
ever before. But knowing how to apply the information and
check the reliability of it is just as
important. To answer the question, "What is
social studies?" the curriculum replies, "The primary
purpose of social studies is to help young people develop
the ability to make informed and reasoned decisions for the
public good as citizens of a culturally diverse, democratic
society in an interdependent world." Another "Essential
Question" raised in the content overview is, "How can we
manage technology so that the greatest number of people
benefit from it?" I believe this is an area where students
must learn to work together in groups and develop common
projects. President Clinton stated that 90% of the people
who lost their jobs did so because they could not work with
others. Media allows opportunities for students to plan and
complete projects collectively, learning how to value and
listen to the ideas of others. In the area of primary/elementary
economics students are expected to distinguish between needs
and wants and to prioritize each. Teachers can implement
units on advertising and its effects on children and adults.
By helping students become aware of how advertisers
manipulate reality, educators can help students distinguish
between needs and wants. "Social studies programs should
include experiences that provide for the study of how people
organize for the production, distribution, and consumption
of goods and services," according to the state curriculum.
One such experience could have students deciding on products
they want to produce and sell.
They could produce advertising videos to
be shown to the schools; run ads in their school newspapers;
and send flyers to other students in their classes. Through
this exercise, students could both learn production skills
and gain better understanding of the media's
effects. The North
Carolina Social Studies Standard Course of Study
Framework provides
many opportunities for the elementary teacher to integrate
medial literacy into the social studies curriculum. This
will help students learn critical thinking skills and become
more informed citizens.
Media
Literacy: An Introduction to Media
Literacy by Dr. David
Considine Media
Literacy: First National Media Literacy Conference at
ASU Media
Literacy: Summit 2000: Reflections on Toronto
Conference
Continued in
next column.