Guest Contributor, Frank Baker, www.frankwbaker.com, Media Literacy Clearinghouse
By Frank W. Baker (Media Literacy Clearinghouse)
I found myself, once again, in the St. Louis area on Wednesday February 10, where I was one of the featured speakers at the 2010 Midwest Educational Technology Conference at the St. Charles Convention Center.
My two hour presentation came at the end of the two day event and I was pleased once again to have area educators come and hear why media literacy should become a priority in our schools.
My workshop came on the heels of the recently released Kaiser Family Foundation report Generation M2: Media In The Lives of Young People Ages 8-18. Once again, the Kaiser survey finds young people cramming more media (and technology) use into a single day, so much so that it surprised even the researchers. (One underplayed fact from the study: young people self-reported that the more media they used, the worse their grades were.)
We know that young people today are enamored of “their” media– that means constantly being on: on the computer, on the phone, etc. What researchers don’t know yet is what impact all of this exposure (and media multitasking) is doing to their brains. (We already know what it’s doing to their bodies: but that’s another story.)
Where does media literacy fit in to all of this? It is clear that many of today’s schools have not yet revised their policies on the appropriateness of using cell phones, blogs and wikis in instruction. Yet many educational publications are abuzz with stories of successful applications of these emerging “new literacies.” Young people today are already publishers, creators and broadcasters—using one tool: the cell phone. And where do they learn how to upload, download? Certainly not the schools. But that will change.
Last July, Education Secretary Arne Duncan urged schools to consider using cell phones for everything from homework to basic communications.
My workshop at METC was designed to demonstrate how media literacy correlates to several of the Show-Me State Teaching Standards. After asking participants to draft their own definitions of media literacy, I shared one of my favorites, which originated from Canada:
“Media literacy,” it says,” is concerned with helping students develop an informed and critical understanding of the nature of mass media, the techniques used by them, and the impact of these techniques. More specifically, it is education that aims to increase the students’ understanding and enjoyment of how the media work, how they produce meaning, how they are organized, and how they construct reality. Media literacy also aims to provide students with the ability to create media products.” (Ontario Board of Ed, 1996)
I called attention to the word “techniques” because it also occurs throughout the Show-Me Standards.
In health, for example, the standard says “use critical thinking skills to analyze marketing and advertising techniques.”
I distributed a magazine advertisement for pizza aimed at young people and without giving the audience any guidance, I asked them, working in groups, to brainstorm how they might use the ad in a classroom setting. After sharing their findings, I introduced the Media Literacy core concepts and critical thinking questions and challenged these educators to dig deeper while engaging students in advertising and marketing messages. Digging deeper might involve:
1. examining the colors used in the ad;
2. considering the layout;
3. thinking about how the eyes move through the various elements in the ad;
4. asking who created the ad; and
5. considering in what magazine the ad was published.
The draft of the new Information, Technology and Media Literacy Standard says “analyze and evaluate media techniques used to convey the message.”
Using this new standard, I introduced my audience to a toy commercial and encouraged them to think about the visual and audio techniques used in the production as well as the common techniques of persuasion. (Teachers should use popular culture texts of their students, like toy commercials, in the classroom. If teachers fail to “meet their students where they are” then their credibility is at stake.) The toy commercial in question is one that I have uploaded to YouTube and built a lesson plan around—thus encouraging teachers to use it.
(The lesson can be found here: http://www.frankwbaker.com/buy_me_that)
Finally, I introduced the language of film. Most teachers use film and most students love the movies, but unfortunately, too many of us watch passively. I believe media literacy encourages us to “turn on” the thinking parts of our brain. When we begin to understand the tools and techniques used by filmmakers, we better appreciate how these create meaning. I showed the opening scene from Steven Spielberg’s “ET- The Extra Terrestrial.” At first, we all watched the clip passively. But the second time around, groups of teachers were given an assignment: each group had to watch the scene a second time, but this time they had to concentrate on one of the languages of film. One group made note of the music; another sound effects; and another how different camera shots were framed. After the second viewing, and a discussion with the colleagues sitting around the table, the educators were anxious to share their findings—a rich discussion ensued and a better understanding of the language of film occurred.
It is clear that teachers need and want this kind of hands-on, interactive, engaging workshop that helps them better understand how to approach media texts and, at the same time, gives them the confidence to dive into media literacy analysis and production.
Teachers need the confidence and the training in order to teach media literacy. Right now, they have neither. But we have a chance to change that in 2010.
All of us need to keep “media literacy” education on the front burner. It is already part of the 21st Century Skills all students need in order to be competent communicators and civically engaged citizens.
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That’s interesting. Is it because they their attention is simply distracted by new media and they aren’t putting their efforts into studying, or is it because the involvement with new media creates some other form of change?