Why should I care about teaching Media Literacy to my students?
Media Literacy is essentially thinking critically about the media one is exposed to everyday -- and the underlying messages, concepts, and ideals that go hand in hand with them -- by deconstruction and evaluation. Knowing the "Who, What, When, Where, Why" of every media one comes in contact with helps that individual understand what influences him/her and (s)he can then make informed decisions. In "Media Literacy: A National Priority for a Changing World", the author states that, "With a goal of
promoting healthy skepticism rather than cynicism, the challenge for the
teacher (or parent) is not to provide answers, but to stimulate more questions
– to guide, coach, prod, challenge the learner to discover how to go about
finding an answer”
(Thoman and Jolls, 2004). This is essential for developing 21st century skills such as discerning marketing strategies and how they influence shoppers and being able to discern fact from fiction in news stories and ads. Students are using technology more than ever before and have developed the ability to multitask with many different types of technology (Rideout, Foehr, and Roberts, 2010). The sooner we can find ways to harness that ability and use it to educate the better, and along the way we can teach them to think critically about what they are being exposed to.